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More "Foolish" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to make a hero out of me," said Walter, hotly, "I won't have it. I only did what anyone would have done, and I made a whole lot of foolish ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... coz, the placid Teutonic mind is impervious to anything so unphilosophical. It will teach him the truth of the adage that 'there is many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip,' and in the future he will not be so foolish as to ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black
... sniggered in a foolish way at Amaryllis, and touched his hat to Iden. "You ain't a been over to Coombe lately, Mr. ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... time to think, before the massive structure of dried pitch-pine which northern charity had erected in the foolish hope of benefiting the freedmen, where the young teachers had labored with such devotion, and where so many of the despised race had laid the foundation of a knowledge that they vainly hoped might lift them up into the perfect ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... the invitation again and read it. It was to be a fancy-dress ball, and all were to wear masks. The waltz which she had learned to dance from Lady Blythebury herself and which was only just coming into vogue in England, was to be one of the greatest features of the evening. There would be no foolish formality, Lady Blythebury had assured her. The masks would preclude that. Altogether the whole entertainment promised to be of so entrancing a nature that she had permitted herself to look forward to it with considerable pleasure. But she might have guessed that Sir Roland ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... the near-following prosperity. And of the contrary part, if evil men come to the stage, they ever go out (as the tragedy writer answered, to one that misliked the show of such persons) so manacled, as they little animate folks to follow them. But the historian, being captived to the truth of a foolish world, is many times a terror from well-doing, and an encouragement ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... hopes, like dead leaves, choke the difficult way; Dark pinions fold dank round the soul, and it hears: "It is night, it is night, it has never been day; Thou hast dreamed of the day, of the rose of delight; It was always dead leaves and the heart of the night. Drink deep then, and rest, O thou foolish wayfarer, For night, like a chalice, holds sleep ...
— Many Voices • E. Nesbit
... Herbert Brande, a passenger on the Majestic, making for Queenstown Harbour, one evening early in the past year. Foolish as the words may seem, they were partly influential in leading to my terrible association with him, and all that is described in ...
— The Crack of Doom • Robert Cromie
... of my friend with the policeman, you would not have cared, would you, to publish that in the first person? But we have no bravery nowadays, and, even in books, must all pretend to be as dull and foolish as our neighbours. It was not so with Hazlitt. And notice how learned he is (as, indeed, throughout the essay) in the theory of walking tours. He is none of your athletic men in purple stockings, who walk their fifty miles a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... others came up and heard what I said, which made me feel foolish, as they'd missed the first part. But Mrs. West beamed at me. I had been thinking that Basil Norman was the sort of man I should love to have for a brother, but Mrs. West as a sister I ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... to herself. "How I love them. The plains are fascinating in a cruelly romantic way, but somehow the mountains make one think of hidden springs rushing swiftly into noisy foolish little brooks, of bird songs, and the smell of cool damp earth, of the crackling of dry twigs under one's feet, and the pungent woodsy smell of camp fires—but there," she broke off confusedly, as she realized the girls were regarding her with fond amusement. "I didn't mean ...
— The Outdoor Girls in the Saddle - Or, The Girl Miner of Gold Run • Laura Lee Hope
... never lets out secrets!" he twinkled. "He's a most discreet old gentleman. People don't make as much use of him as formerly. Very foolish of them, for he came in extremely handy. It's a pity to let good old customs drop. A St. Valentine revival society might be rather a good idea. By the by, that heart isn't anatomically correct! It looks ...
— Monitress Merle • Angela Brazil
... makes a good deal of the foolish and unchivalrous, even brutal, way in which some individuals and some newspapers have spoken of the enemy. I suppose there are few gentlemen who have not winced at such remarks. But let Mr. Methuen glance at the ...
— The War in South Africa - Its Cause and Conduct • Arthur Conan Doyle
... struggle ere they own a crime: She's gone; and leaves me no repenting time. I'll call her now; sure, if she loves, she'll stay; Linger at least, or not go far away. [Looks to the door, and returns. For ever lost! and I repent too late. My foolish pride would set my whole estate, Till, at one throw, I ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden
... people in Havana bad?" asked Margaret, returning the caress, and resisting the impulse to shake the pretty, foolish speaker. ...
— Three Margarets • Laura E. Richards
... corner by the river, instead of warlike warriors, we beheld about a dozen natives hauling in the sharkline we had left baited in the water the previous evening, with a very large shark at the end of it. Being greatly excited they had from time to time yelled out their war-cry. We felt very foolish at being roused from our slumbers for nothing, but still there was some slight consolation in knowing that even the ...
— Wanderings Among South Sea Savages And in Borneo and the Philippines • H. Wilfrid Walker
... like indeed to hear what the stupid rascal is going to announce to these poor foolish devils," muttered Mr. Kretschmer, leaning out of the ...
— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach
... enjoy the drive immensely," Lady Anne answered coolly, "but we shall take it alone. Don't be foolish, Julien. Come and find us a little carriage ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... "Now, wouldn't that come and get you!" he said. "I appeal to you, Hilda. You were present; you heard Miss Holland invite me to this Manifesto Makers' meeting. You know she never said a word to Jack; she didn't even look at him. He was foolish enough to let her see that he was already a convert to her little gospel, and therefore no longer in need of her ministrations. But as for me, 'I was a wandering sheep; I did not love the fold,' and hence, as a good missionary, ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... didn't answer. To tell the truth, she felt rather foolish because she had fallen out of the tree. And she walked back to the woodshed and stalked through the doorway without ...
— The Tale of Miss Kitty Cat - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... or notions may be on the subject; no matter what foolish report the wicked may circulate to gratify an evil disposition; the Lord will continue to gather the righteous and destroy the wicked, till the sound goes forth, IT ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... "Why, you foolish boy," he exclaimed, "it was not likely that you would hit one of those flying bok. It is a matter of long practice; and even the Boers, who have studied such ...
— Off to the Wilds - Being the Adventures of Two Brothers • George Manville Fenn
... [with grave pity] Come: look at me. I am my natural size now: what you saw there was only a foolish picture of me thrown on a cloud by a lantern. How can I ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw
... my lot, or there might have been a worse alternative. I had enough left to pay my passage out here. It was a wise move—the only wise thing I ever did in my life. My expectations on landing were foolish, and before I could realise them I had the chance of going to gaol or becoming a hut-keeper." The last remarks were made as he stood holding the rein ...
— The Gilpins and their Fortunes - A Story of Early Days in Australia • William H. G. Kingston
... success—if Mr. Hammond produces it—then I'll tell them," Ruth said to herself. "But if he tells me it is no good, then nobody shall ever know that I was so foolish as to attempt ...
— Ruth Fielding in Moving Pictures - Or Helping The Dormitory Fund • Alice Emerson
... that clock-making was a business in which he would starve, as it was already overdone in Connecticut. There was one man, he said, engaged in that trade who had been silly enough to make two hundred clocks in one year, and he added that it would take the foolish man a life-time to sell them, or if they went off quickly, the market would be so glutted that no dealer would have need to increase his stock for years to come. Clock-making, he informed the boy, had already reached the limit of its ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... make distinguished origin matter of personal merit, or obscure origin matter of personal reproach. Taunt and scoffing at the humble condition of early life affect nobody, in this country, but those who are foolish enough to indulge in them, and they are generally sufficiently punished by public rebuke. A man who is not ashamed of himself need not be ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... to such suggestions, "we must exercise forbearance. These poor fellows do not regard theft in the same light that we do; besides, it would be foolish to risk losing their friendship. Go down, Meetuck, and invite Awatok and his wife, and half-a-dozen of the chief men, into the cabin. Say I wish to have a ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... be foolish to think that the German Socialists will throw down their rifles on the day when France and Germany come to blows; but it will be very important that the Imperial Government should persuade them that on the one hand we are ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various
... prisoner and the witness faced each other the court room blossomed with smiles. Harold looked very pale and delicate beside the coarse, muscular hostler, who turned red and looked foolish. ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... girl said—and she laughed a little self-consciously. "My reason tells me it's a silly way to feel. I can never quite consider theology and the preachers from the same dispassionate plane that dad can. There's a foolish sense of personal grievance. Dad had it once, too, but he got over it long ago. I never have. Perhaps you'll understand if I tell you. My mother was a vain, silly, emotional sort of person, it seems, ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... ponder it. An ephemera, once buried generations deep in the mire and slime of lower conditions, and now craving blindly but the sunlight of the day, she would have sought the deadly caress of life even though at that moment it had sealed her doom. Foolish or wise, she was as she was; since, under our frail society, life is ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... out." What had she been talking about? He remembered the words "a new nation"—no more. "We've got to grope around in the dark and hunt for new ways and learn as we go. And when you've once got into the work and really felt the thrill of it all—well, then it seems rather foolish and small to bother ...
— His Family • Ernest Poole
... Barnacle was barking his foolish head off. He dashed across from the cook-tent to the woods, and then back again. The boys all urged him on. The girls ran together in ...
— The Girls of Central High in Camp - The Old Professor's Secret • Gertrude W. Morrison
... nor adhere to the ways of peace: men that were the very dregs and pest of mankind; men whom pride and self-conceit had made to over-value their own pitiful crooked wisdom so much as not to be ashamed to hold foolish and unmannerly disputes against those men whom they ought to reverence, and those laws which they ought to obey; men that laboured and joyed first to find out the faults, and then speak evil of Government, and to be the authors of confusion; men whom company, and conversation, ...
— Lives of John Donne, Henry Wotton, Rich'd Hooker, George Herbert, - &C, Volume Two • Izaak Walton
... is all a mistake, it will never come true. I forgot that foolish business at Toul. I have kept out of her sight as much as I could, all these weeks, hoping she would forget that and forgive it—but I know she never will. She can't, of course. And, after all, ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... me, Lord Valdez! pardon me! It was a foolish and ungrateful speech, 95 A most ungrateful speech! But I am hurried Beyond myself, if I but hear of one Who aims to rival Alvar. Were we not Born in one day, like twins of the same parent? Nursed in one cradle? Pardon me, my father! 100 A six ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... the culprit is not familiar with this forfeit he will kiss his own shadow on the wall, but realizes how foolish he was when he sees some other victim place himself between the light and a lady and kiss his shadow which then falls on ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... on the Ethics of Aristotle," printed in 1489.[13] Buridan[14] (died about 1358) is the creator of the famous ass which, as Burdin's[15] ass, was current in Burgundy, perhaps is, as a vulgar proverb. Spinoza[16] says it was a jenny ass, and that a man would not have been so foolish; but whether the compliment is paid to human or to masculine character does not appear—perhaps to both in one. The story told about the famous paradox is very curious. The Queen of France, Joanna or Jeanne, was in the habit of sewing her lovers up in sacks, and throwing them into ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... girl in Muscogee that High Jack was foolish about. He took me to see her a few times. Her name was Florence Blue Feather—but you want to clear your mind of all ideas of squaws with nose-rings and army blankets. This young lady was whiter than you are, and better educated than I ever was. ...
— Options • O. Henry
... "Now don't be foolish!" said Hunt-Goring. "You're absolutely at my mercy, and it's very poor policy on your part not to recognize that fact. Just listen! You want me to let you go, you say. Well, I will let you go—for one small consideration on your part. You've never paid that debt of yours. ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... qualified to make progress, and to gain civilization and culture in exchange for capital, as the Slavonic. All that those people yonder have in their idleness acquired by the oppression of the ignorant masses they waste in foolish diversions. With us, only a few of the specially privileged classes act thus, and the nation can bear with it if necessary; but there, the privileged classes claim to represent the people. As if nobles and mere bondsmen could ever form a state! They have no more capacity ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... a ane tried to find out whaur it was, and, for that matter, I've may be done as foolish a thing myself; but nane ever made it out. There was a scholar, like yoursel', that gaed ae night down to the Abbey, an', ye see, ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous
... that my face fell. Eight dollars would make a large hole in my slender funds—I had been foolish not to have borrowed fifty dollars on the trunk. So I decided to write instead of telegraph; and with him watching me ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... with strangers, or with the wicked. Raphael was delighted to have his bird, and his mother and sister rejoiced at his happiness; but the question now was, What to do? How to live? The bird was there, it is true, but there was no seed for him. This caused Madame Tube to say, "After all we have been foolish to give our last ten-pence for Jacot—we shall suffer for want of it, and in the end the bird will die of hunger. Yes, my Raphael, it is not well to attach our hearts so much to any earthly thing—sooner or later it is taken from us, and then we are miserable. Let us then set our affections ...
— The Young Emigrants; Madelaine Tube; The Boy and the Book; and - Crystal Palace • Susan Anne Livingston Ridley Sedgwick
... wonderful what people, penny-wise and pound foolish, will sometimes do to save 2d. A few years back the sealing-wax on a letter was found to contain L1 10s. in gold coins. There could hardly be a more stupid way ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 353, October 2, 1886. • Various
... leaves this in a few days for Mrs. Bazalgette's house. You tell me you have got a warm invitation there. Then make the play there, and, if you can't win her, say you don't deserve her, twiddle your thumb, and see a bolder lover carry her off. You foolish boy, she is only a woman; she is to be won. If you don't mind, some man will show you it was as easy as you think it is hard. Timid wooers make ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... is foolish. But I'm glad to know you think Mr. Alcando all right. If we've got to live in close companionship with him for several months, it's a comfort to know he is all right. Now when are we to start, how do we go, where shall we make our headquarters ...
— The Moving Picture Boys at Panama - Stirring Adventures Along the Great Canal • Victor Appleton
... that what we supposed to be the fantastic beliefs of the ancients were really truths of nature that we were not yet able to comprehend! The transmutation of metals is an example. We have already gone far enough in that direction to show that the alchemists of old were not the foolish and superstitious people we supposed them to be. We have given far too little credit to past civilizations and we are coming to understand now that we have rated them too low. Our modesty must necessarily increase as it becomes clearer that much of our supposed contribution ...
— Elementary Theosophy • L. W. Rogers
... couldn't stay. I was restless. I had a foolish notion that I should like to be with a better kind of people again—I mean people in a higher position. I still kept answering advertisements for a lady's maid's place, and at last I got what I wanted. Oh yes, I ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... the kind," said Mrs. Wilder, with a quick look at Heath. "Give me my bowl, Mhtoon Pah; you are letting yourself dream foolish things. Absalom"—she tapped the polished floor with her well-shaped foot—"will come back and explain everything himself, and then—whoever ...
— The Pointing Man - A Burmese Mystery • Marjorie Douie
... such as we expected, came from the women folk. When we picked up our caps, and looked at Catherine, feeling rather foolish, she was staring at us with a white face and great scornful eyes. "Fools!" ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... "Foolish woman! That was when there were no priests nor altars. But now things are not managed so easily, and there is a law to ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... there was the question, when this law was extended to Ireland, whether women should be put on those boards. The vote in Parliament was 272 in favor of the women and only 8 against. Eight men only, so unwise, so foolish, left in the great English Parliament, who said it was not for women to deal with those immense bodies of pauper children, not for women to deal with this outdoor relief fund, not for women to deal with the unfortunate mothers ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... the authoritative name of Aaron, looked decidedly foolish, as I turned my clear brown eyes upon him, standing flushed and anxious, with only March wind enveloping his hair all astir with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... may write, thou quickenest, thou strengthenest, or thou quickenedst, thou strengthenedst; but, in the familiar style, or in poetry, it is better to write, thou quickenst, thou strengthenst, thou quickened, thou strengthened. This is language which it is possible to utter; and it is foolish to strangle ourselves with strings of rough consonants, merely because they are insisted on by some superficial grammarians. Is it not strange, is it not incredible, that the same hand should have written the two following lines, in the same sentence? Surely, the printer ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... the lives, as some say, of two millions of men, women, and children (for Caesar, though not positively cruel, was absolutely careless of suffering), and to leave the conqueror master of the Roman world. The coalition indeed was broken up, for Crassus had perished in the East, carrying on a foolish and unprovoked war with the Parthians, and Pompey had come to fear and hate his remaining rival. But Caesar was now strong enough to do without friends, and to crush enemies. The Senate vainly commanded him to disperse his army by a certain day, on pain of being considered ...
— Roman life in the days of Cicero • Alfred J[ohn] Church
... of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them: but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him. Then ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot
... convictions of the worthlessness of mere worldly possessions and pursuits, and such delightful realizations of the happiness of seeking to do the Lord's work, that we are ready to express our astonishment that any human beings can be found so foolish as to devote their energies to the pursuit of things which never can give satisfaction, and which must needs perish. And then, perhaps, we are brought into a state of darkness and despondency, to show us our utter helplessness and unworthiness, ...
— Memoir and Diary of John Yeardley, Minister of the Gospel • John Yeardley
... one can enjoy. My father used to say that the golden treasure at the end of the rainbow in every human life was happiness, and that is something which you cannot buy. So why crave riches, then? But please don't let my foolish ideas disappoint you. I'll ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... could clutch in his fierce hands or draw to his hungry heart. To hell with the future. He reflected that misers permit their thoughts to dwell upon it and die rich and despised, leaving to the apostles of the Present the enjoyment of the fruits of a foolish sacrifice. ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... report, that his tongue, the organ of blasphemy, had been eaten by the worms. He was buried in a city of Upper Egypt, known by the names of Chemnis, or Panopolis, or Akmim; [56] but the immortal malice of the Jacobites has persevered for ages to cast stones against his sepulchre, and to propagate the foolish tradition, that it was never watered by the rain of heaven, which equally descends on the righteous and the ungodly. [57] Humanity may drop a tear on the fate of Nestorius; yet justice must observe, that he suffered the persecution which he ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... be big and clumsy looking, but there isn't anything that can move much quicker than one of those big paws of his when he wants it to. One of them moved now, and quicker than a wink had scooped one of those foolish fish out on ...
— The Adventures of Buster Bear • Thornton W. Burgess
... proverb says, that more know Tom Fool than Tom Fool knows; and the influence of the adage seems to extend to works composed under the influence of an idle or foolish planet. Many corresponding circumstances are detected by readers of which the Author did not suspect the existence. He must, however, regard it as a great compliment that, in detailing incidents purely imaginary, he has been ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... undisturbed in its alkaline or acid virtues by the dread of Deity, or hope of futurity, I know not how far the modern reader may willingly withdraw himself for a little time, to hear of men who, in their darkest and most foolish day, sought by their labour to make the desert as the garden of the Lord, and by their love to become worthy of permission to live with Him for ever. It has nevertheless been only by such toil, and ...
— Our Fathers Have Told Us - Part I. The Bible of Amiens • John Ruskin
... slaveholders of the border states he made a proposal of compensated emancipation. To his great disappointment they rejected this. It was very foolish on their part, and he cautioned them that they might find ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham
... moment at the door, where poor Jennie went in and out so often with a heavy heart. It is a painful record of a great soul struggling with poverty and disappointment; the hope of success as an author so long deferred and never wholly realized. His foolish pride of independence and headship, and his utter obliviousness as to his domestic duties and the comfort of his wife, made the picture still darker. Poor Jennie, fitted to shine in any circle, yet doomed all her married life to domestic drudgery, with ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... hand to the gallows, where, in the presence of Governor Endicott, the two young men were hung. Mary was unmoved by the spectacle. She was given into the care of her son, who came from Rhode Island to plead for her life, and went away with him; but the next spring this foolish woman returned and began preaching and was herself ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... was completely dressed, she consulted her glass and women upon her adjustment; and when she found she wanted no charms to flatter the foolish passion of the African magician, she sat down on a sofa expecting his arrival. The magician came at the usual hour, and as soon as he entered the great hall where the princess waited to receive him, she rose with ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... parents are foolish and train their children after the fashion of the world, the children are in no way to obey them; for God, according to the first three Commandments, is to be more highly regarded than the parents. But training after the fashion of the world I ...
— A Treatise on Good Works • Dr. Martin Luther
... foolish little comedies—utterly unnecessary, curiously pleasant—that occur twenty times a day in Parisian life. Involuntarily the adventurer's heart warmed to the pallid clerk and to the dirty hotel porter. He had arrived ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... everywhere, and dimness, and uncertainty—in his mind, in his eyesight—and sometimes the vagueness was in his speech. He had noticed that—for, sometimes the word he meant to use was not the word he uttered. It had occurred a number of times, making foolish ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers
... this thought in his head he looked out on the river, and fancied the foolish little vessel cast loose and buffeting helplessly ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... and ever dearest brother, I did not mean to weep so; it was very foolish; but then you know we girls weep for almost anything, or nothing; ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... me, my father! pardon me. It was a foolish and ungrateful speech, A most ungrateful speech! But I am hurried 95 Beyond myself, if I but dream of one Who aims to rival Albert. Were we not Born on one day, like twins of the same parent? Nursed in one cradle? Pardon me, my father! A six years' absence is an heavy ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... break her heart about me." "I hope not indeed," I replied, "but I must be allowed to say that I consider your conduct unmanly and dishonourable, and I would advise you, before proceeding further, to pause and reflect whether it is really your heart which dictates your actions, or only a foolish fancy." Knowing how deeply Miss Merril was attached to Arthur, I hoped he would reconsider the matter, and I said as much to him; but all I could say was of no avail, and that very evening he called and, requesting an interview with his betrothed, informed her that, as his sentiments ...
— Stories and Sketches • Harriet S. Caswell
... as I knew him in James Lampton, was a pathetic and beautiful spirit, a manly man, a straight and honorable man, a man with a big, foolish, unselfish heart in his bosom, a man born to be loved; and he was loved by all his friends, and by his family worshipped. It is the right word. To them he was but little less than a god. The real Colonel Sellers was never on the stage. Only half of him was ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... pure chagrin and disappointment, or, as is more likely, from some illness contracted on the voyage, it is impossible to say. He has endured his troubles and hardships like all the rest of them; no less skilfully than Columbus has he won through that terrible tempest of February; and his foolish and dishonest conduct has deprived him not only of the rewards that he tried to steal, but of those which would otherwise have been his by right. He creeps quietly ashore and to his home, where at any rate we may hope that there is some welcome ...
— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young
... husband's execution, but was afterwards pardoned and died in 1557. The tomb was opened in the last century from idle curiosity, and some one attempted to raise the body to a sitting posture, with the result that the skeleton fell to pieces. The tomb was also damaged by this foolish opening. ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: Wimborne Minster and Christchurch Priory • Thomas Perkins
... It would be foolish to say that neither Adam nor Mimi had any fear in returning to Doom Tower. Mimi felt it more keenly than her husband, whose nerves were harder, and who was more inured to danger. Still she bore up bravely, and as usual ...
— The Lair of the White Worm • Bram Stoker
... to one of these gov'ment schools and got my eyes so weak I can't hardly see to thread a needle. I'se crazy bout it I'm tellin' you. I sit up here till God knows how long. They give me a copy to practice and they'd brag on me and that turned me foolish. I jus' thought I was the teacher herself almos'. ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... Mrs. Stewart, who appeared to him, on the contrary, a perfectly healthy young woman. When Ian, alone with him, began tentatively to bring to the doctor's notice the changes in character and intelligence that had accompanied the losses of memory, he found his remarks set aside like the chatter of a foolish child. ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... commonwealth aquatic, Grown tired of order democratic, By clamouring in the ears of Jove, effected Its being to a monarch's power subjected. Jove flung it down, at first, a king pacific. Who nathless fell with such a splash terrific, The marshy folks, a foolish race and timid, Made breathless haste to get from him hid. They dived into the mud beneath the water, Or found among the reeds and rushes quarter. And long it was they dared not see The dreadful face of majesty, Supposing that some monstrous ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... eggs could be bought from a coastguard's wife. And this path avoided the New Town altogether, and took them straight to the cliff-track that skirted growing wheat and blazing poppies till you began to climb the smooth hill-pasture the foolish wheat had encroached upon in the Protection days, when it was worth more than South Down mutton. And now every ear of it would have been repenting in sackcloth and ashes if it had been qualified by Nature to know how little it would fetch ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... Erasmus (1466-1536) employed all his wit and sarcasm, in his celebrated "Praise of Folly," against the theologians and monks, complaining that the foolish people thought that religion consisted simply in pilgrimages, the invocation of saints, and the veneration of relics. Erasmus would have suppressed the monasteries, put an end to the domination of the clergy, and swept away scandalous ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... quae vitio caret, seldom shall you find an absolute face without fault, as I have often observed; not in the face alone is this defect or disproportion to be found; but in all the other parts, of body and mind; she is fair, indeed, but foolish; pretty, comely, and decent, of a majestical presence, but peradventure, imperious, dishonest, acerba, iniqua, self-willed: she is rich, but deformed; hath a sweet face, but bad carriage, no bringing up, a rude ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... Viola look at him, taking in his figure in its motor-dress, and his face, with the foolish, weak elation he couldn't for the life of him keep ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair
... actually spread in Fleet Street at an early hour this morning that this commonplace accident to the telegraph wires was caused by an invading German army. This ridiculous canard is reminiscent of some of the foolish scares which frightened our forefathers a little more than a century ago, when the Corsican terrorized Europe. But our rumour-mongers are too far out of date for this age. It is unfortunate that the advocates of militarism should receive parliamentary support of any kind. ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... what?" he asked, beginning to pace the broad room. "To know whether a man will love you or not! You seem to have forgotten what you are. Is not such a poor and foolish thing as love at the command of those who can say to the soul, be this, or be that, and who are obeyed? Have you found a second Keyork Arabian, over whom your eyes have no power—neither the ...
— The Witch of Prague • F. Marion Crawford
... thing is in thy own power, why dost thou do it? but if it is in the power of another, whom dost thou blame,—the atoms [chance] or the gods? Both are foolish. Thou must blame nobody. For if thou canst, correct [that which is the cause]; but if thou canst not do this, correct at least the thing itself; but if thou canst not do even this, of what use is it to thee to find fault? for nothing should ...
— Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
... happiness in married life. It is a great pity that Tolstoi did not let the powerful little novel speak for itself, and that he allowed himself to be goaded into an explanatory and defensive commentary by the thousands of enquiring letters from foolish readers. Much of the commentary contains sound advice, but it leads off into that reductio ad absurdum so ...
— Essays on Russian Novelists • William Lyon Phelps
... sufficient enemies, such as every nation has. But once fixed in their own land, it will no longer be possible for them to scatter all over the world. The diaspora cannot be reborn, unless the civilization of the whole earth should collapse; and such a consummation could be feared by none but foolish men. Our present civilization possesses weapons powerful ...
— The Jewish State • Theodor Herzl
... for Frances that she did have this expectation of a visit to the Manor to buoy her spirits, for the season scarcely seemed Christmas. Warm weather and plentiful flowers did not appeal to one accustomed to the holiday in wintry Boston, but not the weather alone disturbed Fran. For some foolish reason she disliked intensely the differences of celebration that marked this holiday in another land. Her state of mind both worried and ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... first were very fearful of assisting or coming near him, crying to each other, "He must be a monster!" and perhaps might overset the boat and destroy them; but hearing him speak English, I was very angry with them for their foolish apprehensions, and caused them to clap their oars under him, and at length we got him into the boat. He had an extravagant beard, and also long blackish hair upon his head. As soon as he could speak (for he was almost spent), he ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... 'tis a wild, foolish, dangerous thing; but I do it, nevertheless! As for my reasons, they are the strongest. First, I wish to do it. Second, you've all opposed my doing it. So there's an end ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens
... see that you cannot be cured of the foolish infatuation of taking a husband to yourself. But, pray, let us know whom you intend to marry; I suppose that you do not ...
— The Learned Women • Moliere (Poquelin)
... wisdom rare; Find out his power which wildest powers doth tame, His providence extending everywhere, His justice which proud rebels doth not spare, In every page, no, period of the same. But silly we, like foolish children, rest Well pleased with colored vellum, leaves of gold, Fair dangling ribbons, leaving what is best, On the great Writer's sense ne'er taking hold; Or, if by chance we stay our minds on aught, It is some picture ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... every fool that passeth by These foolish bells shall testify That very fool, forsooth, am I, Good ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... one of our hands, and—and—well, you understand, she had a pretty face, and I was foolish about her. I never meant anything serious; but, you see, if Gladys gets to know about it, she is so absurdly quixotic, she is quite fit enough not ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... little household jokes and tricks of our own. There was one in particular. Whenever I was in here, and Hilda came in, she'd tiptoe through the door and try to get close and surprise me before I heard her. Does it sound foolish to you, mother? If it does, you don't ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... them the whole story as she heard it from her maid, who picked it out of Mary's servant. "She is a foolish creature, and this friend that she pays as much attention to as if she was a lady of quality, is a beggar." "Well, ...
— Mary - A Fiction • Mary Wollstonecraft
... him ridiculous and a being who forced a slighting warmth of liking. His appearance was preposterous, the ready emotion often too foolish for words; but underneath there was a—a goodness, a mysterious quality that stirred her heart to recognition. Certain rare things in life and experience affected her like that memory of an old happiness. She could never say what they might ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... her a chance of speaking to her alone. The poor girl had now far more on her mind that needed help than then when she went in search of it, but she would seek it no more from her! For, the more she thought, the surer she felt that Mary would insist on her making a disclosure of the whole foolish business to Mrs. Wardour, and would admit neither her own fear nor her aunt's harshness as reason sufficient to the contrary. "More than that," thought Letty, "I can't be sure she wouldn't go, in spite of me, and tell ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... Conseil, it turned out to be a foolish business after all, and we jumped into it too hastily. What a waste of time, what a futile expense of emotion! Six months ago we could have been ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... the half mile of which the girl had spoken. A sudden shyness seemed to have come over both of them. Then they began to come in sight of houses. "I am not afraid now," said the girl, "but I do think you are very foolish if you go back alone and try to hunt that man. Ten chances to one he is armed, and you haven't a thing to defend yourself with, ...
— 'Doc.' Gordon • Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman
... I will liken him unto a wise man, who built his house upon a rock; and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock. And everyone that heareth these sayings, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, who built his house upon the sand; and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it" (Matt. ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... and give better results. One of the most important things for successful art-work is to have at hand the proper materials and good instruments. In their selection do not follow a penny wise and pound foolish policy, but get the best you can; and these you will often find not ...
— Crayon Portraiture • Jerome A. Barhydt
... to be a shallow fellow, and to say foolish things about matters he only half understands, and yet he has his place in society. The specialists would grow to be intolerable, were they not counterpoised to some degree by the people of general intelligence. The man who knows too much ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... A foolish hoax is said to have been perpetrated on the authorities at Dublin Castle. An anonymous communication informed them that a Dreadnought had been purchased by the Ulster loyalists, and would shortly make her appearance off the coast of Ireland disguised as an outrigger. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, May 6, 1914 • Various
... a chilliness—not bodily, but about the heart—and, moreover, a foolish dread of looking behind him, after these pastimes. I can imagine precisely how a magician would sit down in gloom and terror after dismissing the shadows that had personated dead or distant people ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... wall as though all my muscles were made of wood. I jumped from my bed with a cry of pain; I could walk only on my heels, the nerves in my toes were so irritated. I passed an hour in this way, completely foolish and stiff as a skeleton. It was the first burst of ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset
... Her voice had an accent of appeal. It was as if she knew she was foolish but yet felt obliged to insist upon ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... gate, and give Absolution with the corpus delicti still under his nose? Our Grand-Almoner Roche-Aymon, for his part, will not higgle with a royal sinner about turning of the key: but there are other Churchmen; there is a King's Confessor, foolish Abbe Moudon; and Fanaticism and Decency are not yet extinct. On the whole, what is to be done? The doors can be well watched; the Medical Bulletin adjusted; and much, as usual, be hoped for ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... Sunday night; and then your licentious tongue had not given the worst name to little puny freedoms, that shew my love and my folly at the same time. But, begone! said he, taking my hand, and tossing it from him, and learn another conduct and more wit; and I will lay aside my foolish regard for you, and assert myself. Begone! said he, again, ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... battle tactics plausibly ascribed to the French by Clerk in his celebrated treatise. It was often successful on the ground, but it did not win campaigns. The mastery of the sea remained with the British, whose blindly headlong attacks with their ships resembled in much the free and often foolish exposure of their troops in the beginning of the present war. Nevertheless, the temper is one which wins, nor is there any necessary incompatibility between a ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan
... invokes him after this manner: Intercede for me, a very miserable man; and recal me by thy intercessions, O father; thou who art strong, pray for me who am weak; thou who art diligent, for me who am negligent; thou who art chearful, for me who am heavy; thou who art wise, for me who am foolish. Thou who hast treasured up a treasure of all virtues, be a guide to me who am empty of every good work. In the beginning of his Encomium upon the forty Martyrs, written at the same time, he thus invokes them: Help me therefore, O ye Saints, with ...
— Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John • Isaac Newton
... with the regular features of the born Greek, perhaps shaded with the pale thoughtfulness of the philosopher or distinguished with the self-confidence of wealth; but not many great, not many mighty, not many noble are there; the majority belong to what in this pretentious city would be reckoned the foolish, the weak, the base and despised things of this world; they are slaves, whose ancestors did not breathe the pellucid air of Greece but roamed in savage hordes on the banks of ...
— The Life of St. Paul • James Stalker
... though these are distinctly unconversational. FitzGerald's Omar, being a pessimist, was probably rich, and being a lazy fellow, was almost certainly a motorist. If any doubt could exist on the point, it is enough to say that, in speaking of the foolish profits, Omar has defined the difficulties of colloquial motoring with a precision which cannot be accidental. "Their words to wind are scattered; and their mouths are stopped with dust." From this follows not (as many of the cut-and-dried philosophers would say) a savage silence and mutual ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton
... always failed her, and as she talked she would look timidly at her, for she was afraid of saying something foolish or out of place: and she never contradicted, but would always agree: "True, ...
— The House with the Mezzanine and Other Stories • Anton Tchekoff
... whether a man wouldn't be right foolish—with all those things I mentioned being right outside to call him—to marry a woman he didn't want for herself, because she had a few hundred head of cows." He smiled down at her. "Don't pull back from me, Billie; I won't lay a finger ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... over her like a wave. She felt like a bit of driftwood, cast up upon a summer shore where flowers and verdure smiled on every side and all was peace; but at the next tide, once more the waters would engulf her and drag her back to the sparkling, restless ocean. She smiled to herself at the foolish simile even as she thought of it. It was absurd to compare the gay life to which she had been accustomed to an engulfing ocean; but never mind, for once she would give her thoughts a free rein and be honest with herself, and acknowledge ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay
... been so permeated by the current notion that no "respectable" woman can possibly have any sexual impulses of her own to gratify that, in order to screen what she feels to be regarded as an utterly shameful and wicked, as well as foolish, act, she declares it never took place by her own will at all. "Now, I ask you, gentlemen," I once heard an experienced counsel address the jury in a criminal case, "as men of the world, have you ever known or heard ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... his first Mandarin, said to him: "Son of Heaven, you make a mistake." To which the Emperor replied: "Kouang, you are foolish." ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat
... Great writes: "Because in it (the Church) the good are mingled with the bad, the reprobate with the elect, it is rightly declared to be similar to the wise and the foolish virgins."(50) ...
— The Faith of Our Fathers • James Cardinal Gibbons
... MacDermott would not join the circle before the fire. She declared that she had too much work to do to waste her time on trash, and she wondered that her brothers-in-law could find nothing better to do than to encourage a headstrong lad in a foolish business. She went about her work with much bustle and clatter, which, however, diminished considerably as John began to read the story, and ended altogether ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... always well to look to one's expenditure, or the much will become much less; and if one has little, and works hard for it, I cannot understand being above receiving the price of one's labor. In all kinds "the laborer is worthy of his hire," and I think it very foolish to talk as if we set no value upon that which we value enough to toil for. With regard to the tickets you wish me to send you, I must refer you to the theater; for, finding that my wits and temper were both likely to be lost in the box-book, I sent the whole away to Mr. Notter, the box-book ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... she said. "You know how unhappy I am; it was foolish of me to break down here, but I could not help it. Besides, there is another thing—I ...
— What Dreams May Come • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... me, after I saw Del Pinzo at the professor's camp," Nort said. "It may sound foolish, but it's worth trying, ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker
... mass, as a thanksgiving for such absurd performances. It was sung by the treasurer Valencia, assisted by his illustrious Lordship; and the sermon was by the father vicar-general, Fray Bartolome Marron—who, carried away by his fervent spirit, emptied his sack of foolish ideas. Among other things, he declared (besides making many threats) that the Order of St. Dominic was the sister of the clergy, and in proof of this alleged that his convent was ruled by the cathedral clock (although this was a matter ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various
... a few lines scribbled in pencil—just that foolish rhyme which to his fevered nerves was like a strong irritant, a poison which gave him an unendurable ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... of this life, O you poor little ignorant vain foolish maidens! if you did but know the way in which the Lovelaces speak of you: if you could but hear Jack talking to Tom across the coffee-room of a Club; or see Ned taking your poor little letters out of his cigar-case, and handing them over to Charley, and Billy, ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of the Apes!" cried the ape-man. "I come to dance the Dum-Dum with my brothers," and he made a motion to the drummers, who immediately took up the cadence of the dance where they had dropped it to watch their king slay the foolish Tarmangani. ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... all normal women along with the maternal instinct—and as a necessary supplement to it. This instinct is more or less futile in most women because they are more or less ignorant of the realities as to wise and foolish expenditure. But it is found in the most extravagant women no less than in the most absurdly ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... all but the hat, she sent for the three princesses - and the king came also. I felt very foolish with my uncovered head; but it was somewhat the less awkward from its being very much a custom, in the royal family, to go without caps ; though none that appear before them use such a freedom. As soon as the hat ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... relaxed into a bacchanalian chaos of trampled debris, merchandise strewn as if a flock of vultures had left their pickings—a battlefield strewn with gewgaws and the tinsel of Christmastide, and reeking with foolish sweat. ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... at Novius in his absence: "Hark ye," says a certain person, "are you ignorant of yourself? or do you think to impose yourself upon us a person we do not know?" "As for me, I forgive myself," quoth Maenius. This is a foolish and impious self-love, and worthy to be stigmatized. When you look over your own vices, winking at them, as it were, with sore eyes; why are you with regard to those of your friends as sharp-sighted as an eagle, or the Epidaurian serpent? But, on the other ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... They might be very foolish, these White Geese, but they were sensible enough to know that Jehosophat ought to have been ...
— Seven O'Clock Stories • Robert Gordon Anderson
... of England, So famous for your looks, Whose sense has braved a thousand fads Of foolish fashion-books, Your glorious standard launch again To match another foe, And refrain From the train While the stormy tempests blow, While the sodden streets are thick with mud, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, VOL. 103, November 26, 1892 • Various
... it is foolish. But I'm glad to know you think Mr. Alcando all right. If we've got to live in close companionship with him for several months, it's a comfort to know he is all right. Now when are we to start, how do we go, where shall we make our headquarters ...
— The Moving Picture Boys at Panama - Stirring Adventures Along the Great Canal • Victor Appleton
... returned, it was to meet a combined volley of protestations against his foolish project of keeping watch all night, from his father, his mother, and Amy. But he declared it was no use talking; and where were the gun and the beans? So they adjourned from the piazza, a lamp was lit, the articles were hunted up, and the gun duly loaded with a good charge ...
— Hooking Watermelons - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... make such an ado. "The primrose by the river's brim" would not have been seen by him at all. This is true of most farmers; the plough and the hoe and the scythe do not develop their aesthetic sensibilities; then, too, in the old religious view the beauties of this world were vain and foolish. ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus
... were stuffed out with shirts and stockings," he said a homely thing in a homely way; that is, he fitted the language to the thought. To fit the expression to the thought on every occasion is the perfection of style. If Franklin had been a weak, foolish writer, his sentence might have taken ...
— Higher Lessons in English • Alonzo Reed and Brainerd Kellogg
... labors, crops out in almost every city. Consecrated pictures leave church walls for the garret; silver crosses go into the refining pot; auricular confession is neglected; many superstitious ceremonies and foolish restrictions, imposed by the priesthood, are regarded only as a curious relic of the past. We note, also, a growing friendliness towards Protestants, and occasionally very sensible efforts, in emulation of them, to educate ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume II. • Rufus Anderson
... in a dream, I listened to words that I will not recall, making good those accusations. And through all that false witness there seemed to me to run, as it were, a thread of those foolish, boy-wise words of mine that had, and meant, no harm, but on which were now built mountains of seeming proof. So that, when at last all those men had spoken I was dumb, and knew that I had no defence. ...
— A Thane of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... is a god! Hanno is a god!—get out of here, Henry Myton,—get out of here, I say—this is my busy day," and he laughed the young senator out of the room. But he sat alone in his office grinning, as over and over in his mind his own words rang, "Hanno is a god!" And the foolish parrot of his other self cackled the phrase in his soul for ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... member of the crew, a lanky youth with whitish eyebrows and a foolish face. He stammered, and made a queer noise when he laughed: "Chee-hee-hee." Twice he had been turned down in the confirmation classes; after all, what was the use of learning lessons out of a book when nobody ever had patience to wait while ...
— The Great Hunger • Johan Bojer
... she had condescended to give the latter a supercilious nod. Her conversation was generally of the silly, vacuous sort, concerning chiefly new dresses or bonnets, and Shirley at once read her character—frivolous, amusement-loving, empty-headed, irresponsible—just the kind of girl to do something foolish without weighing the consequences. After chatting a few moments with Mrs. Ryder she would usually vanish, and one day, after one of these mysterious disappearances, Shirley happened to pass the library and caught sight of her and Mr. Bagley conversing in subdued and eager tones. It ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... reason why you should pity him. He brawled at random, and therefore got what he deserved. I know him: he is a good fellow, industrious, strong and not a bit foolish. But to argue is not his business; I may argue, because I am the master. It isn't simple to be master. A punch wouldn't kill him, but will make him wiser. That's the way. Eh, Foma! You are an infant, and you do not understand these things. I must teach you ...
— Foma Gordyeff - (The Man Who Was Afraid) • Maxim Gorky
... having her doubts resolved, she was more uncertain, more perplexed than ever. "What" cried she, "can all this mean? How strange, and how inexplicable! Is it a real person that I have seen, or is it a vision that mocks my fancy? Am I loved, or am I hated? Oh, foolish question! Oh, fond illusion! Are we not parted for ever! Is he not gone to seek the mistress of his soul! Alas, he views me not, but with that general complacency, which youth, and the small pretensions I have to beauty are calculated to excite! He had nothing to relate that concerned myself, ...
— Damon and Delia - A Tale • William Godwin
... groaned. When Rihoriho overthrew his idols and burned his temples he knew nothing of Christianity; but he had discovered that his idols were no gods, and that the religion of his fathers was utterly abominable and foolish. In many islands, when a chief lotued before his subjects, he did so at the risk of being deposed by them; and in every direction there are instances of rebellions being raised by the heathens against the chiefs who had professed Christianity. For many years the fact, that whole communities of ...
— The Cruise of the Mary Rose - Here and There in the Pacific • William H. G. Kingston
... at the assured futility of my attempts. Plainly, if there was to be fighting over this matter, I ought not to seek a usurpation of Tom's right. And fighting there would be, I knew, whether I said yea or nay. Since Tom must have a second, that place was mine. And I felt, too, with a young man's foolish faith in poetic justice, that the right must win; that his adversary's superiority in age—and therefore undoubtedly in practice, Falconer being the man he was—would not avail against an honest lad avenging the probity of a sister. ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... reminds me we have a small portable trench machine, which closes up like a valise, easily handled and carried about. One man near had a box full of needles distributed in his back by a bomb; he considers himself disgraced; he says it will be kind of foolish in years to come to show his grandchildren twenty-five or thirty needles and tell them that they were ...
— "Crumps", The Plain Story of a Canadian Who Went • Louis Keene
... a satire on Christian martyrdom (13). Peregrinus(140) is a Cynic philosopher, who after a life of early villainy is made by Lucian to play the hypocrite at Antioch and join himself to the Christians, "miserable men" (as he calls them), "who, hoping for immortality in soul and body, had a foolish contempt of death, and suffered themselves to be persuaded that they were brethren, because, having abandoned the Greek gods, they worshipped the crucified sophist, living according to his laws."(141) Peregrinus, when a Christian, ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... while yet but a seed, A nettle rear'd up his inglorious head. The gard'ner would wisely have rooted him up, To stop the increase of a barbarous crop; But the master forbid him, and after the fashion Of foolish good nature, and blind moderation, Forbore him through pity, and chose as much rather, To ask him some questions first, how he came thither. Kind sir, quoth the nettle, a stranger I come, For conscience compell'd to relinquish my home, 'Cause I wouldn't subscribe to a mystery ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... 'tis not so warm. I feel so strange, I know not how— I wish my mother would come home. Through me there runs a shuddering— I'm but a foolish timid thing! ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... did half make up my mind to speak to you, and came this morning on purpose; and then as soon as I saw you I felt that it was foolish—a sort ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... these "watered" stocks in good faith as an investment in the honest hope of dividends it seems sufficient to say, in the words of an ancient Roman, "Against stupidity the gods themselves are powerless." Laws that would adequately protect the foolish from the consequence of their folly would put an end to all commerce. The sin of "over-capitalization" differed in magnitude only, not in kind, from the daily practice of every salesman in every shop. Nevertheless, the popular fury that it aroused ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... going away with his money, thinking with delight of the pleasure he should have in skating, and also of the money that would be left to carry home to his poor father, when the gambler said to him, "You foolish boy, why won't you play longer, and double your dollar? You may as well have two ...
— The Pedler of Dust Sticks • Eliza Lee Follen
... This American facility of electrical invention has one great cause, one specific reason for its fruitfulness. It is because so many acute minds have mastered the simple laws of electrical action. This knowledge not only fosters intelligent and fruitful experiment but it prevents the doing of foolish things. No man who has acquired a knowledge of mechanical forces, who understands at least that great law that for all force exerted there is exacted an equivalent, ever dreams upon the folly of the perpetual ...
— Steam Steel and Electricity • James W. Steele
... at us," said Sahwah, feeling terribly foolish. "Quit telling fortunes, Hinpoha. It's all ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... France flashed up, to die down again the next moment. It was probably a stupid missal of Plantin's printing, about 1580. Where was the likelihood that a place so near Toulouse would not have been ransacked long ago by collectors? However, it would be foolish not to go; he would reproach himself for ever after if he refused. So they set off. On the way the curious irresolution and sudden determination of the sacristan recurred to Dennistoun, and he wondered in a shamefaced way whether he was being decoyed into some purlieu to be made away with ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... Similar foolish questions were then put to her. Had the saints long hair? She did not know. And what language did they converse ...
— Joan of Arc • Ronald Sutherland Gower
... whole truth when next I go down to Redman's Farm. In the meantime, you must not plague poor Miss Radie with your nonsense. She has too much already to trouble her, though of quite another sort. Good-night, foolish old Tamar.' ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... have begun to cry]. It has been so wrong and foolish of us. We have never learnt to ...
— Fanny and the Servant Problem • Jerome K. Jerome
... of our candid friends the syndicalists are not to be slighted. Their solution of the problem, that the workers should come into actual, literal possession and management of the industries, whether publicly or privately owned, may appear to us hopelessly foolish and impractical, but their misgivings regarding an ever-increasing bureaucratic control over a large proportion of the workers, who are thus made economically dependent upon an employer, because that employer chances also to ...
— The Trade Union Woman • Alice Henry
... that he put Ebenezer down on the road again and was about to walk along about his business when what did that foolish little Ebenezer do but up and deny ...
— Andiron Tales • John Kendrick Bangs
... utter these words, and others of the same kind, when I should have been thinking rather how my place in hell was pleasant in comparison with the place I deserved. But now and then my love makes me foolish, so that I lose my senses; only it is with all the sense I have that I make these complaints, and our Lord bears it all. Blessed be so good ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... (love-talker). He does not appear, like the Leprechaun, with a purse in one of his pockets, but with his hands in both of them, and a dudeen (short pipe) in his mouth, as he lazily strolls through lonely valleys making love to the foolish country lasses and "gostering" with the idle "boys." To meet him meant bad luck, and whoever was ruined by ill-judged love was said to ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox
... frequent mention in the Word of love and charity, works and deeds, and keeping the Commandments, and the declaration that the man who keeps the Commandments is blessed and wise, but the man who does not is foolish. They said that on reading these things they saw them only as matters of faith, and passed them by with their eyes closed, ...
— Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence • Emanuel Swedenborg
... who shall live for ever," said Dicky, his lips lost in an odorous cloud of 'ordinaire.' "But there be evil tongues and evil hearts; and if some son of liars, some brother of foolish tales, should bear false witness upon this thing before our master the Khedive, or ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... this, with his social position, his pseudo-heroic poetry, and his dissipated life,—over which he contrived to throw a veil of romantic secrecy,—made him a magnet of attraction to many thoughtless young men and foolish women, who made the downhill path both easy and rapid to one whose inclinations led him in that direction. Naturally he was generous, and easily led by affection. He is, therefore, largely a victim of his own weakness and ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... she got the position at the office or got married. She certainly couldn't go back to the office and explain it all to them. At least, she wouldn't. It would be better, even if Cousin Anna did treat everybody as if they were ten and very foolish. . . . And she had refused the offer of a nice foursome and one of Lucille's cheerful friends, to stay home ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer
... seed of a king,' said I to myself, and really I was affected, Planchet, which leads me to think I am entering upon a foolish business. And that is why I wished to consult ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Arnold had just quoted there could not be a more foolish criticism. Keats was dogged by a curious vulgarity (which produced occasional comic effects in his work), but his self-abandonment was not vulgar. It may have been in a sense immoral: he was an artist who practised ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd
... Smyth were hanged. I was dreaming the most melancholy things in the world of poor Stella, and was grieving and crying all night.—Pshah, it is foolish: I will rise and divert myself; so good-morrow; and God of His infinite mercy keep and protect you! The Bishop of Clogher's letter is dated Nov. 21. He says you thought of going with him to Clogher. I am heartily glad of it, and wish you would ride there, ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... marquis, perhaps endowed with the conjugal philosophy which alone pleased the taste of the period, perhaps too much occupied with his own pleasure to see what was going on before his eyes, offered no jealous obstacle to the intimacy, and continued his foolish extravagances long after they had impaired his fortunes: his affairs became so entangled that the marquise, who cared for him no longer, and desired a fuller liberty for the indulgence of her new passion, demanded and obtained a separation. She then left her husband's house, and ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... hands which, too weak for the stern task assigned them, poured out the love-potion in place of the death-draught. "Woe, woe," she wails, "eternal, irredeemable woe, instead of brief death! Behold the pernicious work of a foolish fondness blossoming heavenward ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... was Boulson's father—if Boulson was tall and fair, with blue eyes, and a pepper-castor mark on his right arm, where a charge of dust-shot had lodged from a horse-pistol. There had, he informed me, been family misunderstandings about a foolish fancy formed by Boulson for a military career. And Boulson had gone off—God bless him—like the high-spirited Irishman that he was—to enlist as a private soldier. And then came the news of the serious ...
— Tomaso's Fortune and Other Stories • Henry Seton Merriman
... he rose from the table, and mounting the ladder, "On second thought," said he, addressing Skysail again, "I won't throw the cats overboard; the sailors have a foolish superstition about that animal—its d——d unlucky. No; put them alive in a bread-bag, and send them on shore ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... possess an unlimited power. It acts on matter if we know how to domesticate it. The imagination is like a horse without a bridle; if such a horse is pulling the carriage in which you are, he may do all sorts of foolish things and take you to your death. But harness him properly, drive him with a sure hand, and he will go wherever you like. Thus it is with the mind, the imagination. They must be directed for our own good. Autosuggestion, formulated with the lips, is an order which the unconscious receives, it carries ...
— Self Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion • Emile Coue
... who decreed that the descendants of his brother Adolphus should govern Holstein, jointly with the King of Denmark, and that Holstein and Schleswig should belong to them in common, neither making any change in Holstein without the consent of the other A more foolish arrangement could not have been conceived, for anyone might have foreseen that it would lead to disputes and troubles. In fact, quarrels continually arose, until, at the Peace of Rosahild, in 1658, the ...
— A Jacobite Exile - Being the Adventures of a Young Englishman in the Service of Charles the Twelfth of Sweden • G. A. Henty
... dealing with the same place and people. The calm face of Penelope would, it may be, begin to grow meaner before our eyes, like a face changing in a dream. She would begin to appear as a fickle and selfish woman, passing falsely as a widow, and playing a double game between the attentions of foolish but honourable young men, and the fitful appearances of a wandering and good-for-nothing sailor-husband; a man prepared to act that most well-worn of melodramatic roles, the conjugal bully and blackmailer, the ...
— Robert Browning • G. K. Chesterton
... Fanny insisted; "it may be awfully foolish and ark-like to say, but you're all I want, absolutely." Her manner grew indignant. "Some women at tea today laughed at me. They did nothing but describe how they held their husbands' affections; actually that, as though it were difficult, necessary; ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... my affairs. You may each come, I mean you and your friend the Baron de Canalis, to Havre for the last two weeks of October. My house will be open to both of you, and my daughter must have an opportunity to study you. You must yourself bring your rival, and not disabuse him as to the foolish tales he will hear about the wealth of the Comte de La Bastie. I go to Havre to-morrow, and I shall expect you ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... glasses to wipe away the moisture gathering so fast upon them. Then resuming them, she continued: "I'm a hewer of wood—a drawer of water. God made me so, and shall the clay find fault with the potter for making it into a homely jug? No, indeed; and I was a very foolish old jug to think of sticking myself in with the chinaware. But I've larnt a lesson," and the philosophic woman read on, feeling comforted to know that though a vessel of the rudest make, a paltry jug, as she called herself, the promises were still for her as much as for the finer ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... having studied but little, must need take as their standard of beauty mere gold and azure, and these, with supreme conceit, declare that they will not give good work for miserable payment, and that they could do as well as any other if they were well paid. But, ye foolish folks! cannot such artists keep some good work, and then say: this is a costly work and this more moderate and this is average work and show that they can ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci
... by their taste. "They are hard and sour before they are full grown, and so the taste is not pleasant, and nobody wants to eat them,—except sometimes a few foolish boys, and these are punished by being made sick. When the apples are full grown they change from sour to sweet, and become mellow; then they can be eaten. Can you tell me of any other fruits which are ...
— The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... of the most foolish women in the world. She was very handsome at the time of my arrival in France, and her figure was as good as her face; besides, she was not so much disregarded by others as by my husband; for, before the Chevalier de Lorraine became her lover, she had had a child. I knew well that nothing had passed ...
— The Memoirs of the Louis XIV. and The Regency, Complete • Elizabeth-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Orleans
... After puffing and swelling for some time, "What think you," said she, to her young ones, "will this do?" "Far from it," said they. "Will this?" "By no means." "But this surely will?" "Nothing like it," they replied. After many fruitless and ridiculous efforts to the same purpose, the foolish Frog burst her skin, and ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... a pretty name, whichever way you put it. When I heard of the treasure she's so foolish as to keep on her sideboard, I felt sure that your father had made up his mind to rob Miss Stivergill—with the help of that bad man Bill Stiggs—all the more w'en I see how your father jumped w'en I mentioned Rosebud Cottage. Now, Tottie, we must save your father. If he had only got me to post ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... help it," she replied, turning to the house. "I had no natural liking for him, and I could not force it. I don't believe he has gone away for that trifling reason, Mr. Roy. If he has, he must be very foolish." ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... the Springtime On the farm out in the West, When my world held nothing for me that I wanted, (Save a courage all undaunted), And my foolish little rhymes, Were but heart beats, rung in chimes, That I sounded, just to ease my life's unrest. Yes, I sang them, and I rang them, Just ...
— Poems of Experience • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... his secret was at the woman's discretion. He answered in an apologetic tone: "It was certainly foolish of me to lose my temper with you, but I had some provocation. Forgive me, and let bye-gones be bye-gones. Whom do you suspect of ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... appealed to her, when she stood, all ready for bed in her foolish nightgown—a mere veil of chiffon—becomingly guarded by a Japanese kimono of the softest silk. She visualized the timeless desert outside her tent, the trackless ocean of silence, the uninhabited primitive ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... contract at the bidding of his master, or who can sue by the actions exercitoria or institoria, may in lieu thereof bring an action in respect of the peculium and of conversion to uses; but it would be most foolish of him to relinquish an action by which he may with the greatest ease recover the whole of what is owing to him under the contract, and undertake the trouble of proving a conversion to uses, or the existence of a peculium ...
— The Institutes of Justinian • Caesar Flavius Justinian
... are doing something very wrong and foolish," said Miss Ludington, feebly, as the carriage ...
— Miss Ludington's Sister • Edward Bellamy
... to fight some other world, and go through young life's old routine again. Oh! the metempsychosis! Oh! Pythagoras, that in bright Greece, two thousand years ago, did die, so good, so wise, so mild; I sailed with thee along the Peruvian coast last voyage — and, foolish as I am, taught thee, a green simple boy, how to splice a rope! ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... a great deal about the "vile body"; and many are encouraged by the phrase to transgress the laws of health. But Nature quietly suppresses those who treat thus disrespectfully one of her highest products and leaves the world to be peopled by the descendants of those who are not so foolish. ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various
... thee, I shall not die, Woman of high fame and name; Foolish men thou mayest slay I and ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... if he doesn't know that every time he looks at her, or speaks her name, he tells her. But I suppose he has some foolish mannish pride about waiting ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... could? It's an idle question, I know; wise men and musty philosophers say that regrets are foolish. But I speak for myself only when I say that I would gladly wheedle old, gray-bearded Tempus into making the wheels click backward till I could see again the buffalo-herds darkening the green of Northwestern prairies. They and the blanket Indian ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... It was, therefore, with astonishment that the young general received the enthusiastic letter of the poetess; and, while showing it to some of his intimate friends, he said, with a shrug of his shoulders, "Do you understand these extravagances? This woman is foolish!" ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... representative English audience, the males preponderating in number. They watched me intently as I mounted the steps of the rostrum and arranged my port-folio upon a musical tripod; then I seated myself for a moment, and tried to still the beating of my foolish heart. ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... yourself, but it was for something. You have given papa such pleasure and comfort, as you can't help being glad of. That is very different from us foolish ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... was in a terrible fright at hearing this; she ran to acquaint her mother with it; and asked her what they had best do; but her mother, who was but a foolish mouse, bade her not be under the least alarm, for she was persuaded the farmer did not mean to take it in just then; and added, it was time enough to think of it when the men began; she told Downy to go to bed with ...
— Little Downy - The History of A Field-Mouse • Catharine Parr Traill
... wanted for the grand orchestra was good musicians, and, when any one objected to our two colored performers, we triumphantly referred to the exacting and satisfactory test they had undergone as sufficient answer to the foolish clamors of all those afflicted with 'color-phobia.' Seeing the managers of the Jubilee thus resolved, and convinced that the two colored men were artistic performers,—superior in ability to many with whom they were to be associated,—no ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter
... you when you wanted a friend to come to me? Why did you doubt me, foolish fellow? Pick up those shillings; get a bed and a supper. Come and see me to-morrow at nine o'clock; you know where,—the same house in Curzon Street; you shall tell me then your whole story, and it shall go hard but I'll buy you another crossing, or get you something ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... run him through with my bayonet," he answered with the foolish intonation peculiar to soldiers; "and if he made off, I ought to shoot him," he added, obviously proud of knowing what he must do if ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... few necessary things, and make haste to go with him into the launch; adding that, by remaining in the ship, I should incur an equal share of guilt with the mutineers themselves. I reluctantly followed his advice—I say reluctantly, because I knew no better, and was foolish; and the boat swimming very deep in the water—the land being far distant—the thoughts of being sacrificed by the natives—and the self-consciousness of my first intention being just—all these considerations almost ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow
... be found, upon strict enquiry, that there is hardly one in twenty of those miserable objects who do not owe their present poverty to their own faults, to their present sloth and negligence, to their indiscreet marriage without the least prospect of supporting a family, to their foolish expensiveness, to their drunkenness, and other vices, by which they have squandered their gettings, and contracted diseases in their old age. And, to speak freely, is it any way reasonable or just, that those who have denied themselves many lawful satisfactions and conveniences of life, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift
... itself. She listened, as she had listened before, without moving. It was not louder than the whittling of a mouse behind the wainscot, hardly louder than the scraping of a mole's thin hand in the soil. It continued. Then it stopped. It was only her foolish fancy after all. There it was again. ...
— The Lowest Rung - Together with The Hand on the Latch, St. Luke's Summer and The Understudy • Mary Cholmondeley
... cap in his hand, and his gun at his feet. Beside him sat Vinie Mocket, dressed in her best. Vinie's eyes were downcast, and her hands clasped in her lap. She wondered—poor little partridge!—why she was there, why she had been so foolish as to let Mr Adam persuade her into coming Vinie was afraid she was going to cry. Yet not for worlds would she have left Saint Margaret's; she wanted, with painful curiosity, to see the figure in bridal ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... himself sitting there with a flush of heat at his hair-roots, half-angry and half foolish as he realized how he had ...
— We're Friends, Now • Henry Hasse
... ornaments set with tiny pearls, diamonds, or sapphires. Of these I noticed that Jimmie admired the pearl-studded cigar-cases and match-safes most, but for some reason I waited to make my purchase in London, which was one of the most foolish things I ever have done in all my foolish career, and right here let me say that there is nothing so unsatisfactory as to postpone a purchase, thinking either that you will come back to the same place or that you will see better ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... another moment, it stopped; down went its head, up went its infernal heels; and Hans found himself some ten yards off, in the middle of a pool. He escaped drowning, but the cap was gone; he had been foolish enough to stitch some dollars, in hard cash, recently received, into it along with his paper, and they sunk it, past recovery! He came home, dripping like a drowned mouse, with a most deplorable tale; but with no more knowledge ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... yet farther apart,' said I, 'and that he might fairly find his way into the thickest of this foolish crowd, and take a short revenge upon his civilized tormentors. What a spectacle is this—more strange and savage, I think, looked upon aright, than that which we are going to enjoy—of you, Gracchus, ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... a wobbly old buckboard sat a young couple completely engrossed by each other. That he was a Westerner we knew by his cowboy hat and boots; that she was an Easterner, by her not knowing how to dress for the ride across the desert. She wore a foolish little chiffon hat which the alkali dust had ruined, and all the rest of her clothes matched. But over them the enterprising young man had raised one of those big old sunshades that had lettering on them. It kept ...
— Letters on an Elk Hunt • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... set to work to organize the proper distribution of the food supply and the cultivation of the land. He wasted no more time on foolish pleasures, and in due course the land East of the Rising Sun enjoyed happiness and prosperity and even established fruitful colonies in the plain overlooked by the Palace ...
— Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends • Gertrude Landa
... I laughed, but Strickland was not amused. He took his moustache in both fists and pulled at it till it nearly came out. Fleete, instead of going off to chase his property, yawned, saying that he felt sleepy. He went to the house to lie down, which was a foolish way ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... war does not invariably avert war any more than a fire department in a city will invariably avert a fire; and there are well-meaning foolish people who point out this fact as offering an excuse for unpreparedness. It would be just as sensible if after the Chicago fire Chicago had announced that it would abolish its fire department as for our people to take the same view as regards military preparedness. Some years ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various
... he did not know. He felt the water rushing about his head again; he felt that he had been drowned, and he knew, too—in that foolish way in which the half-awakened brain knows the supposed certainties of dreams—that the white hand he had essayed to hold had grasped his beard firmly under his chin, and that thus holding his head above the surface of the water, ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... been thinking of me or of Herbert all this time! But then he had been thinking of a matter of life and death. How all, all my foolish feelings took to flight! It was some comfort that my lover had not either seen or suspected them. He thought he must have been nearly senseless for some time. The last he remembered was, we were looking at ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... says, being so doggoned tired that I knew if I sat down I'd fall asleep. 'I'm for pushing back to camp, and if you ain't all kinds of a foolish boy, you'll do ...
— W. A. G.'s Tale • Margaret Turnbull
... Well, now ye see he is a king. Look to him, Theridamas, when we are fighting, lest he hide his crown as the foolish king of ...
— Tamburlaine the Great, Part II. • Christopher Marlowe
... and danger, for all her soothing of her crying babe, for all the whistling of the wind, for all the uncertainty of her situation, she still turned to look at the deserted and water- swept cabin. She remembered oven then, and she wondered how foolish she was to think of it at that time, that she wished she had put on another dress and the baby's best clothes; and she kept praying that the house would be spared so that he, when he returned, would have something ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... James should acknowledge the penalty of the fatal power he had to draw a whole nation into his quarrel, just or unjust, by risking himself the first, is so entirely just according to every rule of personal honour, yet so wildly foolish according to all higher policy; exposing that very nation to evils so much greater than the worst battle. Flodden was still far off in the darkness of the unknown, but had this description been written after that catastrophe, it ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... protest and to say them later. There were drinking temptations and one used to wonder with a sick heart, what mothers would feel if they could see these young boys of theirs sometimes, so pathetically young and so foolish. There was also in these great camps of men—let us realize that quite clearly—great good for the boys and the men—good that far outweighs the evil. All the good of discipline, all they gained by ...
— Women and War Work • Helen Fraser
... her hatred of her late husband's elder son. Hers were not reasons that could easily be put into words. They were little reasons, trivial grains of offence which through long years had accumulated into a mountain. They had their beginning in the foolish grievance that had its birth with her own son, when she had realized that but for that rosy-cheeked, well-grown boy borne to the Marquis by his first wife, Marius would have been heir to Condillac. Her love of her own child and her ambitions ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... advantage of this division of opinion, and especially of the fact that most of their opponents were on the wrong path; and fought to keep matters absolutely unchanged. These men demanded for themselves an immunity from government control which, if granted, would have been as wicked and as foolish as immunity to the barons of the twelfth century. Many of them were evil men. Many others were just as good men as were some of these same barons; but they were as utterly unable as any medieval castle-owner to understand what the public interest really was. There have been aristocracies ...
— Theodore Roosevelt and His Times - A Chronicle of the Progressive Movement; Volume 47 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Harold Howland
... was written before dramas were. Of the drama, Victor Hugo and Dumas are the well-known and respectable guardians. Every piece Victor Hugo has written, since "Hernani," has contained a monster—a delightful monster, saved by one virtue. There is Triboulet, a foolish monster; Lucrece Borgia, a maternal monster; Mary Tudor, a religious monster; Monsieur Quasimodo, a humpback monster; and others, that might be named, whose monstrosities we are induced to pardon—nay, ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was foolish, good Rupert. I did but smile at thy friends to make thy task easier. Now see; I leave thee unfettered, and thus." She drew his head down and lightly kissed his hair, laughing with a little tremor: "Think of what I asked of thee, Rupert. To-morrow I ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... I do abhor this your wicked saying; For, no doubt, they increase much sin and vice: Therefore I pray you, show not your meaning, For I delight not in such foolish fantasies. ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley
... in the foolish hope that with the deductions of this section we should be able suddenly to win over any of the decided adversaries of faith in providence and miracles. For, as we have had occasion to remind the reader, the acknowledgment ...
— The Theories of Darwin and Their Relation to Philosophy, Religion, and Morality • Rudolf Schmid
... of Commynes, after so judicious a sketch, we may add another: Please God that people may no more suffer themselves to be taken captive by the corrupting and ruinous pleasures procured for them by their masters' grand but wicked or foolish enterprises, and may learn to give to the men who govern them a glory in proportion to the wisdom and justice of their deeds, and by no means to the noise they make and the risks ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume III. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... be a remarkably foolish dog in his old age; but I, growing old beside him, would learn wisely foolish things from his excellent folly. I knew we should both be happier for it; knew it was best for us both to prove that my thin white friend had been ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... Don Fernando," I answered. "I can easily understand that you find it exceedingly difficult to regard me as a welcome guest, and believe me, I am not going to be so foolish as to feel hurt at your frankly telling me so. And I heartily unite with you in the hope that as long as we may be compelled into intimate association with each other, we shall be able to forget that ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... took me that some harm had happened to her: till I could stand it no longer, but picked up the lamp and crept in for a book. There she lay sleeping, healthy and sound, and prettier than you'd ever think. . . . I crept back to my chair, and a foolish sort of hope came over me that, with her health and wits, and being brought up unlike other children, she might come one day to be a little lady and the pride of the place, ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... of trying to amuse silly little kids. I told the foolish little animal about people having arteries cut, and your having to cut the whole thing to stop the bleeding. And he said, 'Was that what the plumber would do to the leaky pipe?' And how pleased your governor would be to find it mended. And then he ...
— New Treasure Seekers - or, The Bastable Children in Search of a Fortune • E. (Edith) Nesbit
... impression of abject bowed heads and chains rattled beneath desks, was roughly correct. For all that was human in a man, this was a prison. These men who bent over foolish papers were evidently convicts of the most desperate character; so, at all events, you would judge when occasionally one or other of the prison-governors, known as "partners," passed among them with the lash of his eye. Such faint human twittering as ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... for you that you've thought about it thus deeply. You've found a gap in it, an error. You should think about this further. But be warned, oh seeker of knowledge, of the thicket of opinions and of arguing about words. There is nothing to opinions, they may be beautiful or ugly, smart or foolish, everyone can support them or discard them. But the teachings, you've heard from me, are no opinion, and their goal is not to explain the world to those who seek knowledge. They have a different goal; their goal is salvation from suffering. ...
— Siddhartha • Herman Hesse
... coming back. But finally they did come. Josie received them with the calmness that comes of hope deferred. It had been three years since she last saw the play. She told herself, chidingly, that she had been sort of foolish over that play and this costume. Her recent glimpse of Haddon had been somewhat disillusioning. But now, when she finally held the gown itself in her hand—the original "Splendour" second-act gown, a limp, soft black mass: just a few yards of worn and shabby velvet—she ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... nature of contents, and radically elevated standard of editorship, mark an era in the progress of the Association; since the UNITED AMATEUR is really the nucleus of our activity and a reflection of the best in our current thought and ideals. We have this year helped to shatter the foolish fetichism which restricts the average official organ to a boresome and needless display of facts and figures, relating to the political mechanism of amateurdom. The organ has been a literary one, as befits a literary ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... Sunday afternoon she had herself driven to Mrs. Finn's house in Park Lane, instead of waiting for her friend. Latterly she had but seldom done this, finding that her presence at home was much wanted. She had been filled with, perhaps, foolish ideas of the necessity of doing something,—of adding something to the strength of her husband's position,—and had certainly been diligent in her work. But now she might run about like any other woman. "This is an honour, ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... his tender mercy would not allow Satan to gain an advantage over me. By the grace of God my heart says,—Lord, if I could be sure that it is thy will that I should go forward in this matter, I would do so cheerfully; and, on the other hand, if I could be sure that these are vain, foolish, proud thoughts, that they are not from thee, I would, by thy grace, hate them, ...
— The Life of Trust: Being a Narrative of the Lord's Dealings With George Mueller • George Mueller
... judgment, derived from the nature of the object, by another judgment, derived from the nature of the understanding. It is certain a man of solid sense and long experience ought to have, and usually has, a greater assurance in his opinions, than one that is foolish and ignorant, and that our sentiments have different degrees of authority, even with ourselves, in proportion to the degrees of our reason and experience. In the man of the best sense and longest experience, this authority is never entire; ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume
... their appreciation was expressed in an unfortunate manner. It is a consolation or a misfortune that the wrong kind of people are too often correct in their prognostications of the future; the far-seeing are also the foolish. ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... in Bacon's day that we only learn to command nature by obeying her. To ignore facts is to court disappointment in our measure of progress. The particular fact with which we have here come in contact is very vital and radical, and most subtle in its influence. It is foolish to ignore it; we must allow for its existence. We can neither attain a sane view of life nor a sane social legislation of life unless we possess a just and accurate knowledge of the fundamental instincts upon which ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... plainly impossible in the early centuries of the present era, and it is therefore foolish to ask why Pagan moralists did not do what we expect Christian moralists to have done. I have already mentioned, and have fully described elsewhere, how humanitarian sentiments were generally diffused throughout the old Graeco-Roman world. There is not ...
— The War and the Churches • Joseph McCabe
... tried to understand the general course of events and to take part in it by self-sacrifice and heroism were the most useless members of society, they saw everything upside down, and all they did for the common good turned out to be useless and foolish—like Pierre's and Mamonov's regiments which looted Russian villages, and the lint the young ladies prepared and that never reached the wounded, and so on. Even those, fond of intellectual talk and of expressing their feelings, who discussed ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... title, a 'catchy' title, and for this reason, which is surely a legitimate one, since it is strictly in accordance with the prevailing custom of advertisement—the firm of Hamar, Curtis and Kelson adopted it. They did not expect—they were not so extraordinarily foolish as to expect—any one would take them literally. They thought—as you and I think—that sorcery cannot be taken seriously—that it is confined to fairy tales—and that, as a fairy tale, it is potent ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell
... over the rail the glare of the sun on the tumbling water lit up his foolish, mongrel features, exposed their cunning, their utter lack of any character, and showed behind the shifty eyes the ...
— Once Upon A Time • Richard Harding Davis
... her practical mind, he could never have been so foolish as to let himself care deeply for one who so obviously had only the most casual regard for him! She knew women did these silly things, but surely not men—and hard-headed men ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... threshold of our camp Shaw, in endeavouring to dismount, lost his stirrups, and fell prone on his face. The foolish fellow actually, laid on the ground in the hot sun a full hour; and when I coldly asked him if he did not feel rather uncomfortable, he sat up, ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... mere repetition. Harnack is so certain that the German and Englishman are almost alike that he really risks the generalization that they are exactly alike. He photographs, so to speak, the same fair and foolish face twice over, and calls it a remarkable resemblance between cousins. Thus he can prove the existence of Teutonism just about as conclusively as Haeckel has proved the more tenable proposition of the non-existence ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... not to persist in this foolish curiosity," he said, almost fiercely, "it will bring you ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... fingers rested in his clasp, delighted to feel themselves so small, and his so strong. He had spoken to her in the low voice that was hers alone. She was jealous lest Bridget should have overheard it. But Bridget was at the other end of the room. How foolish it had been of her—just because she was so happy, and wanted to be nice to everybody!—to have asked Bridget to stay with them! She was always doing silly things like that—impulsive things. But now she was married. She must think ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... this fervid enthusiasm and hero-worship was all very immature, very foolish, as the general public acknowledged after it had taken time to cool off. Yet there was something appealing about it, after all. At any rate, the press deemed the public sufficiently interested in the subject to warrant giving it considerable prominence, and the name of Darwin ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... of driftwood, cast up upon a summer shore where flowers and verdure smiled on every side and all was peace; but at the next tide, once more the waters would engulf her and drag her back to the sparkling, restless ocean. She smiled to herself at the foolish simile even as she thought of it. It was absurd to compare the gay life to which she had been accustomed to an engulfing ocean; but never mind, for once she would give her thoughts a free rein and be honest with herself, and acknowledge that the life ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay
... and joyfully, that of all things I had been wanting most to play in Shakespeare; that in Shakespeare I had always felt I would play for half the salary; that—oh, I don't know what I said! Probably it was all very foolish and unbusinesslike, but the engagement was practically settled before Mrs. Bancroft left the house, although I was charged not to ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... a hundred foolish ideas about art, its nature and value, it is of the greatest importance that we should attain to a right idea of it, not only as a matter of theory to be discussed, but as a religion to be practised. And, if we can grasp this right idea of ...
— Recent Developments in European Thought • Various
... said Mrs. Church. "And here's a fresh egg for you. Take your place, Tom; and when the others go into the yard for their foolish mummeries—for I can't make out that there's a bit of sense in this scheme from first to last—why, you and I will finish up what is ...
— The Rebel of the School • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... partition separating it into two sections, one of which may be kept, either by additional piping or less ventilation, several degrees warmer than the other. So, while a general collection of many plants can be grown successfully in the same temperature, it is foolish to try everything. Only actual experiment can show the operator just what he can and cannot do with his small house. Even where no glass partition is used, there will probably be some variation in temperature in different parts of the house, and this condition may be turned to advantage. ...
— Gardening Indoors and Under Glass • F. F. Rockwell
... they discovered I was in correspondence with a Nihilist circle in London, and when I was arrested, I demanded the rights of an American citizen. That doomed me. I was sent, without trial, to the Trogzmondoff in April of this year. Arriving there I was foolish enough to threaten, and say my comrades had means of letting the United States Government know, and that a battleship would teach the gaolers of the ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... replied the giant, gravely. "He has seen so much to puzzle him since he went away, that he sometimes feels foolish." ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne
... view, is pleased to dote. Nor are mine ears with thy tongue's tune delighted; Nor tender feeling, to base touches prone, Nor taste, nor smell, desire to be invited To any sensual feast with thee alone: But my five wits nor my five senses can Dissuade one foolish heart from serving thee, Who leaves unsway'd the likeness of a man, Thy proud heart's slave and vassal wretch to be: Only my plague thus far I count my gain, That she that makes me sin ...
— Shakespeare's Sonnets • William Shakespeare
... said Watterly, giving Holcroft his hand. "You know I didn't mean any offense, Jim. It was only one of my foolish jokes. You were mighty slow to promise to love, honor, and obey, but hanged if you aint more on that line than any man in town. I can see she's turning out ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... who have no such revelation, and who judge according to their own wisdom, such as the Jews, Turks and heathen, must consider the Christian's declaration the greatest error and rankest heresy; they must say that we Christians are mad and foolish in imagining that there are three Gods, when, according to all reason—yea, even according to the Word of God—there can be but one God. It would not be reasonable, they will say, that there should be more than one householder over the same house, more than one lord or sovereign over the same ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther
... each an hour long. Smoked and doubted eight hours. Slept twelve. As self-contained as an oyster. Rarely spoke save in monosyllables. But never said a foolish thing. Never laughed. Perplexed by a joke. Conceived everything on a grand scale. When a question was asked, would put on a mysterious look. Shake his head. Smoke in silence. Observe, at length, he had doubts. Presided at the council, in state. Swayed a Turkish ...
— Higher Lessons in English • Alonzo Reed and Brainerd Kellogg
... and there the other cot where Frank pretended to sleep and kept his vigil . . . there the chair . . . and there the dab of yellow in the rug that the sun struck into faded gayety in the morning . . . and there the crack across the mirror, the wriggling, distorted, foolish crack that seemed alive for all its sameness. And there was always the noise of wind which became a corollary of his pain, pulsing with it, never quiet, an overtone ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... and to suffer, regardless of the applause of men, as St. Gregory Nazianzen observes. (Or. 3, in Julian.) That father, when he knew him a student at Athens, in 355, prognosticated (Or. 4, in Julian, p. 122) from his light carriage, wandering eye, haughty look, impertinent questions, and foolish answers, what a monster the Roman empire was fostering and breeding up. In his march to his Persian expedition, he was made a subject of mockery and ridicule at Antioch, on account of his low stature, gigantic gait, great goat's beard, and bloody sacrifices. In answer ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... no reaction either, to speak of, no gloomy disgust. She was physically acceptable to him. He could always talk to her in a genial, teasing way, even tender, for she did not offend his intellectuality with prudish or conventional notions. Loving and foolish as she was in some ways, she would stand blunt reproof or correction. She could suggest in a nebulous, blundering way things that would be good for them to do. Most of all at present their thoughts centered ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... been thinking over what he said. (Suddenly) But when you look at me like that, how I long to be a fool and say, "Come away with me now, now, now," you wonderful, beautiful, maddening woman, you adorable child, you funny foolish little girl. (Holding up a finger) Smile, Melisande. Smile! (Slowly, reluctantly, she gives him a smile.) I suppose the fairies taught you that. Keep it for me, will you—but give it to me often. Do you ever laugh, Melisande? We must laugh ...
— Second Plays • A. A. Milne
... probably remember also that when we were talking over the coming of our second child five years ago you said that I was foolish to be disturbed about it—that if I had not had the wherewithal to feed and clothe it I might have had good cause for complaint, but otherwise not. That is another matter we must settle before we reopen life together. Mere food and clothes ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger
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