"Disdain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... life,[61] his disappointments and passions, his commonplace and often degrading work, soon wore him out and, finally, exhausted his power. "Would you believe it?" he wrote to his friend Ferrand, "that which used to stir me to transports of musical passion now fills me with indifference, or even disdain. I feel as if I were descending a mountain at a great rate. Life is so short; I notice that thoughts of the end have been with me for some time past." In 1848, at forty-five years old, he wrote in his Memoires: "I find myself so old and tired and lacking inspiration." At forty-five ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... Balzac had well named it ce boisson fade et melancolique; the novelist's disdain being the better understood as we reflected he had doubtless only tasted it as concocted by French ineptitude. We were very merry over the liver-colored liquid, as we sipped it and quoted Balzac. But not for a moment had our merriment deceived the brown eyes and the fluttering cap-ribbons. A ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... that they had ever any such power to give; we even deny that there exists in all the human race a power to make the government of any state dependent upon individual will. We disclaim, we reject all such doctrines with disdain and indignation; and we have brought them up to your Lordships to ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... energy; and very soon a committee of parliament submitted a proposition, asking the United States to consent to a commercial arrangement precisely such as had been offered by Mr. Adams a few years before, and rejected with disdain. ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... acquainted with Mrs. Maroney, as she was proud and arrogant, and would disdain to form the acquaintance of any low "white trash" like him. Whenever Mrs. Maroney went to Philadelphia he followed her and excused his frequent absences to Josh. by stating that he went up to get his arm dressed. That ...
— The Expressman and the Detective • Allan Pinkerton
... alluring in the prospect of exchanging all this to settle down with Charles Stuart, even though one would be living with dear Mother MacAllister, with whom one was always happy. She looked at Charles Stuart, about to speak out her disdain, when the expression of his face suddenly checked her. Even as a child Elizabeth had a marvelous intuition, which told her when another's feelings were in danger of being hurt. It gave her a strange, quite unacknowledged feeling that she was far older and wiser than the children she played ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... remorse? Could you be the victim of one who has no merit but his love for you, and who, if that love destroy you, becomes utterly redeemed? Yes, Lucy, I was wrong—I will do you justice; all this, nay, more, you could bear, and your generous nature would disdain the sacrifice. But am I to be all selfish, and you all devoted? Are you to yield everything to me, and I to accept everything and yield none? Alas! I have but one good, one blessing to yield, and that is yourself. Lucy, I deserve ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the crocheted nucleus with an air of the loftiest disdain. "Of course, of course," said he, "but you really oblige me, Miss Asher, to speak very plainly and frankly and to say that I really do not care about playing tennis, but that I want to speak to you on a most important subject, which, for reasons that I will explain, must be ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton
... Foundlings' Hospital had been scorned. It seemed to me that it was the most abject thing in the world to be a foundling. I did not want Mrs. Milligan and Arthur to know. Would they not have turned from me in disdain! ...
— Nobody's Boy - Sans Famille • Hector Malot
... condition disgraceful to civilized society;' the composition and exhibition of that bloody tragedy, 'Sultan Amurath;' the conduct of a protracted war which arose out of a fancied insult from a factory boy, whom, surveying with intense disdain, 'he bade draw near that he might 'give his flesh to the fowls of the air!'' the government of the imaginary kingdom of 'Tigrosylvania'—occupied the attention of this hundred-handed youth until his death, at the age of sixteen—all of which is narrated with unequalled pathos ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... Mr. F. S * *. He is not such a fool as I took him for, that is to say, when he speaks of the North. But still he speaks of things all over the world with a kind of authority that a philosopher would disdain, and a man of common sense, feeling, and knowledge of his own ignorance, would be ashamed of. The man is evidently wanting to make an impression, like his brother,—or like George in the Vicar of Wakefield, who found out that all the good things had been said already on the right side, and ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron
... breezes warm. See the old ascetic yonder, Ah, poor withered form! Where he crouches wrinkled over by unnumbered years Through the leaves the flakes of moonfire fall like phantom tears. At the dawn a kingly hunter passed proud disdain, Like a rainbow-torrent scattered flashed his royal train. Now the lonely one unheeded seeks earth's caverns dim, Never king or princes will robe them radiantly as him. Mid the deep enfolding darkness, follow him, oh seer, While ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... respect. Her youth and beauty; her manifest ignorance of evil; her superb disdain of convention, which could only come through hereditary dignity; her terrible fear and suffering—for there must be more in her unhappy condition than meets the eye—would all demand respect, even if one did not hasten to yield it. Nevertheless, I ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... not one so lovely or so good, Among the num'rous daughters of the plain; 'Twas Yarico each Indian shepherd woo'd; But Yarico each shepherd woo'd in vain; Their arts she view'd not but with cold disdain. For British Inkle's charms her soul confest, His paler charms had caus'd her am'rous pain; Nor could her heart admit another guest, Or time efface his image ...
— Four Early Pamphlets • William Godwin
... the cupboard empty. He went back to the same restaurant for tea, and after a gloomy meal went round to discuss the situation with Ted Stokes. That gentleman's suggestion of a double alibi he thrust aside with disdain and a stern appeal ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... indifference, neutrality; coldness &c adj.; anaphrodisia^; unconcern, insouciance, nonchalance; want of interest, want of earnestness; anorexy^, anorexia, inappetency^; apathy &c (insensibility) 823; supineness &c (inactivity) 683; disdain &c 930; recklessness &c 863; inattention &c 458. anaphrodisiac^, antaphrodisiac^; lust-quencher, passion-queller^. V. be indifferent &c adj.; stand neuter; take no interest in &c (insensibility) 823; have no desire for &c 865, have no taste for, have ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... part of all. But it must be done, she thought; he had told her once that were she Hagar Warren's grandchild he should not be riding with her—how much less, then, would he make that child his wife! and rather than meet the look of proud disdain on his face when first she stood confessed before him, she resolved to go away where no one had ever heard of her or Hagar Warren. She would leave behind a letter telling why she went, and commending to Madam Conway's care poor Hagar, who ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... lusty courser's rein Under her other was the tender boy, 32 Who blush'd and pouted in a dull disdain, With leaden appetite, unapt to toy; She red and hot as coals of glowing fire He red for shame, but frosty ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare
... other than elevating her brows. Victorine looked at the other with an exact mirroring of her mother's disdain. ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... (their contempt for their country, its laws, and affairs, to the contrary notwithstanding), as though they had not been expressing, an hour or two before, the most entire ignorance and thorough disdain of and for railroads, politics, and politicians, and particularly the railroad just mentioned, and the politics and politicians of the United States. If Ashburner had listened to this, he would have learned that it is very often the custom among American gentlemen to sneer at ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... creating or recreating and maintaining in being such a structure a large part of our energies must be devoted, and in all this from the Romans we have still much to learn. If we decline to learn and digest this lesson, turning from such concernment in disgust or disdain, our lives will be lost in vain dreams, in idle longings and empty regrets; and the kingdom of Freedom and Truth will be taken from us and given to others who have known how to grow up and to face like men the hardships and hazards without which it cannot be won or held. ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... claimed it as their right that the actors should play naked, probably, it has been thought, as a survival of a folk-ritual. But the Romans, though they were eager to run to the theatre, felt nothing but disdain for the performers. "Flagitii principium est, nudare inter cives corpora." So thought old Ennius, as reported by Cicero, and that remained the genuine Roman feeling to the last. "Quanta perversitas!" as Tertullian ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... carefully; and secretly, if the truth be told, I was glad to find that Madame de Cocheforet was such a woman. I was glad that she had laughed as she had—with a ring of disdain and defiance; glad that she was not a little, tender, child-like woman, to be crushed by the first pinch of trouble. For if I succeeded in my task, if I contrived to—but, pish! Women, I told myself, were all alike. She would find ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman
... society—crowds of ill-bred men who adore her, 'a genoux bas', betwixt a puff of smoke and an ejection of saliva—society of the ragged red, diluted with the low theatrical. She herself so different, so apart, so alone in her melancholy disdain. I was deeply interested in that poor woman. I felt a profound compassion for her. I did not mind much even the Greek, in Greek costume, who 'tutoyed' her, and kissed her I believe, so Robert said—or the ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... animals like men; it was his defect that he pitied men almost too much like animals. Foulon said of the democracy, 'Let them eat grass.' Shaw said, 'Let them eat greens.' He had more benevolence but almost as much disdain." ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... and Austria in their war for world power. During the past five months we have heard German apologists offer the most contradictory arguments to prove, first, that Russia, next, that France and Belgium, and, finally, that England began the struggle. The Kaiser himself, with that disdain of fact which is the privilege of autocrats, declared that the sword was forced into his hands. And all the while the mere abstention of Italy from supporting Germany and Austria gave the lie to the Germanic ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... and a marvelous necklace of diamonds, she sat with superior mien in an opera box. Now and again, with an air of infinite ennui and disdain, she glanced coolly aloft through her lorgnette at the eager poor in the steep, high altitudes ...
— A Book Without A Title • George Jean Nathan
... mother will come to wait upon me, respectfully kiss my hands, and say to me, Sir' (for she will not dare to call me son-in-law, for fear of provoking me by such a familiar style), I entreat you not to disdain to look on my daughter, and refuse to come near her. I assure you that her chief delight is to please you, and that she loves you with all her soul.' But in spite of all my mother-in-law can say, I will not answer her one word, but keep an obstinate gravity. Then she will throw herself at ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 2 • Anon.
... she deemed an iniquitous award of king James," though urged to submit to it by her first husband, the Earl of Dorset;— "She rebuilt her dismantled castles in defiance of Cromwell, and repelled with disdain the interposition of a profligate minister under Charles the Second." A woman of such dauntless spirit and conduct would be a fitting subject, even for the pencil of the mighty magician of Abbotsford. A journal ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 13, No. 354, Saturday, January 31, 1829. • Various
... disappointed King bethought himself of the stabbing suggestion next, and, with his shuffling manner and his cruel face, proposed it to one William de Bray. 'I am a gentleman and not an executioner,' said William de Bray, and left the presence with disdain. ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... thought of as such,—watching days and months sometimes for a few facts; correcting still his old records,—must relinquish display and immediate fame. In the long period of his preparation he must betray often an ignorance and shiftlessness in popular arts, incurring the disdain of the able who shoulder him aside. Long he must stammer in his speech; often forego the living for the dead. Worse yet, he must accept—how often!—poverty and solitude. For the ease and pleasure of treading the old road, accepting the fashions, the education, the religion of society, ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... a stigma upon their Negroes, such as we, who live in Europe, could not have conceived, unless we had had irrefragable evidence upon the point. What evils has not this cruel association of terms produced? The West Indian master looks down upon his slave with disdain. He has besides a certain antipathy against him. He hates the sight of his features, and of his colour; nay, he marks with distinctive opprobrium the very blood in his veins, attaching different names and more or less infamy to those who have it in them, ...
— Thoughts On The Necessity Of Improving The Condition Of The Slaves • Thomas Clarkson
... therefore, having vaulted over, he would have helped her, she looked over him, and past him, and through him, and mounted unaided, confident of herself, proud and supremely disdainful both of the stile and Barnabas; and then—because of her pride, or her disdain, or her long cloak, or all three—she slipped, and to save herself must needs catch at Barnabas, and yield herself to his arm; so, for a moment, she lay in his embrace, felt his tight clasp about her, felt his quick breath upon her cheek. Then he had set her down, ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... the idea. I came forward under an imaginary guard of the enemy's soldiers, produced my paper, and read it through. For answer, Clarence struck the paper out of my hand, pursed up a scornful lip and said with lofty disdain: ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... do not disdain the meanest locals, provided the beer is good and to their taste. Naked pine tables do not disgust them, nor the hardest benches. Often on the table skins of radishes, crusts of bread, cigar stumps, tobacco ashes, herring heads, and cheese rinds ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... action and his speech; he tries his pen in a Latin distich of prayer; his signature is a mystical pietistic device.[12] He was pre-eminently fitted for the task he created for himself. Through deceit and opprobrium and disdain he pushed on toward the consummation of his desire; and when the hour for action came, the ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... and rather capricious benevolence, selected all sorts of objects for their bounty. To get an education for nothing, and a future livelihood and profession assured, was so excellent a scheme that some of the richest people did not disdain it, and not only great men's relations, but great men themselves, sent their sons to ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... sovereign continued, "while you, sir, were entering the Inland Sea, charged with this offer of peace"—his majesty tossed the precious piece of paper on the table with a look of disdain—"a Russian gunboat, the Korietz, was firing the first shot of the war at one ...
— The International Spy - Being the Secret History of the Russo-Japanese War • Allen Upward
... veiled language about her sister; but such an idea would strike Miriam as monstrous, as a mad and horrible nightmare. Mark shivered at the mere fancy of the chill that would come over her and of the disdain in her eyes. Besides, what right had he on the little he knew to involve Esther with her family? Superficially he might count himself her younger brother; but if he presumed too far, with what a deadly retort might she not annihilate his claim. Most certainly he was not entitled ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... loneliness had no fears for her. If she heard a whistle on the avenue, the honk of a car—the familiar old signals of the boys and girls, she smiled her disdain, and curling comfortably in her great chair, bent her lovely head ...
— The Day of the Beast • Zane Grey
... a kinsman's; for the Stephanopouli were of blood the emperors did not disdain to mate with. In the last rally the Turks had much ado with them as leaders of the Moreote tribes around Maina, and north along Taygetus to Sparta. Yes, and there were some who revived the Spartan name in those days, maintaining the fight ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... Master, for I was not yet Qualified to engage as an Able-bodied Mariner, when I met the Chaplain again, this time alone, and coming out of a pastryman's shop. I would have passed him, as holding both him and his master in Disdain, but he Arrested me, and beckoned me into an Entry, there to have ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... said Gerald, with utmost coolness and disdain. "I leave you perfectly free in that direction, but you shan't tell lies or disobey me. Now stay in ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield
... the gentleman in him was visible, that he ought to disdain the flat cap and blue gown, that here was his opportunity, and that among the Badgers he would soon be so rich, famous, glorious, as to wonder that he had ever tolerated the greasy mechanical life of a ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... the air is calm, the sky serene, Though wide the broad and leafy arms are spread, Yet still the scars of recent wounds are seen; Their shelter henceforth seems but insecure; The winged tribes disdain the frequent lure, Where many a songster lies benumb'd or dead; And when I would the flow'ry tendrils train, I find my late delightful ...
— Poems • Matilda Betham
... lawn, and long, sloping meadows, on to the silver Thames, alive with steamboats ploughing, white sails bellying, and great ships carrying to and fro the treasures of the globe. From this fair landscape and epitome of commerce she retired each time with listless disdain; she was waiting ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... night in New York. Smith says that my books are upon the table of every member of the Committee for framing a constitution of government for France, except Tom Paine, and he is so conceited as to disdain to have anything to do with books. Although I abused Smith a little above, he is very clever and agreeable; but I have been obliged to caution him against his disposition to boasting. Tell not of your prosperity, because it will ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... shame and distress. She tried to console him by assuring him that she would forget entirely what he had just said to her and would always look on him as her best friend; assurances which were small consolation to the Comte as one might imagine. He felt the disdain which was implicit in all that the Princess had said, and seeing her the next day with her customary untroubled looks redoubled ...
— The Princess of Montpensier • Madame de La Fayette
... she said with cold disdain, so much more effective to wound than hot passion, "that you are offering ...
— The Lair of the White Worm • Bram Stoker
... poor little chapel, built of uprights, gave place in 1675 to a stone church erected by the efforts of M. Filion, proctor of the seminary, and it was noted for an admirable picture given by the viceroy, de Tracy, who did not disdain to make his pilgrimage like the rest, and to set thus an example which the great ones of the earth should more frequently give. This church lasted only a few years; Mgr. de Laval was still living when a third temple was built upon its site. ...
— The Makers of Canada: Bishop Laval • A. Leblond de Brumath
... whom Providence has placed me, and whom I dislike, whose look of disdain humiliates me, whose slowness worries me, who makes me jealous by being more beloved, more successful, than myself, whose chatter and lightheartedness, even her very ...
— Gold Dust - A Collection of Golden Counsels for the Sanctification of Daily Life • E. L. E. B.
... she shall see us? You say that you are a sailor, and I have been told that sailors are amazingly ingenious creatures, surely you can think of something, some act that would better our position!" She spoke querulously, with an undertone of the old disdain that formerly marked her ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... do you say! It is very diverting to find you treating it with so much disdain. Are you, who express such an indifference on the subject, aware, that as soon as it is known that M. Fouquet is going to receive me at Vaux next Sunday week, people will be striving their very utmost to get invited to the fete. ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... The greater need of haste in seeking a union with Persia. Were Sapor dead to-day, to-morrow an embassy should start for Ecbatana. But think not, Piso, I harbor ill will toward you, or hold your offer in contempt. A Queen of the East might not disdain to join herself to a family, whose ancestors were like yours. That Piso who was once the rival, and in power—not indeed in virtue—the equal of the great Germanicus, and looked, not without show of reason, to the seat ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... old scholars. Pooh! Hopelessly out of date. But I could never feel that. I have a deep affection for Graevius and Gronovius and the rest, and if I knew as much as they did, I should be well satisfied to rest under the young man's disdain. The zeal of learning is never out of date; the example—were there no more—burns before one as a sacred fire, for ever unquenchable. In what modern editor shall I find such love and enthusiasm as glows in ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... she say him nay? Oh no, he won the day, Could an Elliot a Russell disdain? And he's ta'en awa' his bride Frae the bonnie Teviot-side, And has left me ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell
... commands the winged herald bear The finished nymph, th' inextricable snare. To Epimetheus was the present brought: Prometheus' warning vanished from his thought— That he disdain each offering of the skies, And straight restore, lest ill to man arise. But he received, and, conscious, knew too late Th' insidious gift, and felt ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... by a formal decision to forbid her porter to admit Monsieur de Rastignac, and to show him, herself, something more than disdain when she met him in society; for his insolence far surpassed that of other men which the marquise had ended by overlooking. At first she thought of keeping the letter; but on second ...
— Study of a Woman • Honore de Balzac
... eulogies upon Benjamin Franklin, George Washington and William McKinley. Nor is he alone in his devotion to the American idea. The small boy curses his neighbor by calling him 'un Espanol,' and treats you with disdain if you suggest that he is simply a poor Porto Rican. 'No, no,' he says, pointing at himself. 'No, Espanol, Porto-Rican Americano.' His motives are not, however, always of the sincerest, for the boys have learned a trick of saying to the passing Yankee; 'Viva ...
— Porto Rico - Its History, Products and Possibilities... • Arthur D. Hall
... turn, keeping his little cane in his left hand, and saluting with his right. Albert's lips scarcely whispered "Good-by," but his look was more explicit; it expressed a whole poem of restrained anger, proud disdain, and generous indignation. He preserved his melancholy and motionless position for some time after his two friends had regained their carriage; then suddenly unfastening his horse from the little tree to which his servant ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... stood quite still for a moment and did not lift its foot. Instead of that, the creature seemed to be eying Basil Bearover with a look of disdain. Finally a most astounding thing happened, for Dick's lip curled back, exposing his teeth, and from his mouth there seemed to ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... view, he did not disdain to use in his best productions much of the Scottish dialect, the vernacular of the plowman and the shepherd. The literary men of Edinburgh, who would rather have been convicted of a breach of etiquette than of a Scotticism, tried to induce him to write pure English; but the Scotch words which ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... scholar, went no more. In about ten days after, meeting the same gentleman, Mr. Jordan, in the street, he offered to pass by without saluting him; but the tutor stopped, and inquired, not roughly neither, what he had been doing? "Sliding on the ice," was the reply, and so turned away with disdain. He laughed very heartily at the recollection of his own insolence, and said they endured it from him with wonderful acquiescence, and a gentleness that, whenever he thought of it, astonished himself. He told me, too, that when he made his first declamation, ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... admiration elicited by the death of Queen Victoria is an encouraging sign. It shows that the vulgar ideals, the false moral measurements, the feverish social ambitions, the love of the ostentatious and the factitious, and the disdain for simple habits, pleasures, and characters so apparent in certain conspicuous sections of society, have not yet blunted the moral sense or perverted the moral perceptions of the great masses on either ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... of consequences. In the case of the great British admiral the tendency of this view, which has been reproduced in successive biographies down to the latest, is to sink one of the first of naval commanders beneath the level of the pugilist, who in his fighting does not disdain science, to that of the game-cock; and it is doubtless to be attributed to the emphasis he himself laid upon that direct, rapid, and vigorous action without which no military operations, however wisely planned, can succeed. In the want of this, rather ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... the more easily carry away the coveted trophy. The thought of cheating in such a matter never occurs to his unsophisticated mind; and as for leaving his "colors" in barracks, while he goes in the field himself, he would disdain it—nay, cannot practise it; for the obvious reason that his head would have to be left ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... crouched on the floor by her side, listening eagerly. Now and then she would say: "Oh! how clever you were!" "So he never guessed." "Yes, yes, and then, what did he say then?" urging her on with a feverish greed for details, which my affianced did not disdain to impart lazily, the faint, contemptuous smile always upon the pink lips I had not ventured ...
— A Village Ophelia and Other Stories • Anne Reeve Aldrich
... vizier's wife, which will rejoice me extremely. Her mother will then wait upon me, respectfully kiss my hands, and say to me, Sir, (for she will not dare to call me her son-in-law, for fear of provoking me by such familiarity), I pray you not to disdain my daughter, by refusing to approach her: I assure you that her chief study is to please you; and that she loves you with all her heart. But my mother-in-law might as well hold her peace; I will not make her the least answer, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... across his vision. His persistent indifference, the inhibition that held him in a contemptuous isolation, again possessed him, Howat, a black Penny. A last trace of his emotion, caught in the flood of his paramount disdain, vanished like a breath of warm mist. He entered the house and mounted to his room; the stairs creaked but that was the only sound audible within. His candles burned without their protecting glasses in smooth, unwavering flames. When they ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... Ovid enumerate them among the universal evils introduced by the Iron age (Metamorphoses, i.). The despotic will of the princes themselves was exerted in vain; the mischief was too deep-rooted to succumb even to the decrees of the masters of the world. Nor did the divi themselves disdain to be initiated in the infernal or celestial science. Nigidius Figulus and the two Thrasylli are magical or mathematical names closely connected with the destinies of the two first imperial princes. Nigidius predicted, and perhaps promoted, the future elevation of Octavianus; and the elder ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... Street he changed cars, continuing his homeward flight in the direction of Russian Hill. He prided himself on the fact that he still clung to one of the old quarters of the town, scorning the outlying districts with all the disdain of a San Franciscan born and bred of pioneer stock. He liked to be within easy walking distance of work, and only a trifle over fifteen minutes from the shops and cafes and theaters. And his present quarters in a comparatively new apartment house just below the topmost height of ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... blowed!" SAYERIUS said. "Wus luck, They wasn't Trojans. This is British pluck!") Then from the Corner fiendish howls arise, And oaths and execrations rend the skies. ENTELLUS stoutly to the fight returned. Kicked, punched and mauled, his eyes with fury burned, Disdain and conscious courage fired his breast, And with redoubled force his foe he pressed, Laid on with either hand like anything, And headlong drove his rival round the Ring; Nor stops nor stays, nor rest, nor breath allows. Thereon the Corner ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98 January 11, 1890 • Various
... following peculiarities (by no means recommendatory) in the work selected by the most fortunate of the jewel-hunters; it is catalogued "The Sleeping Beauty," by D. Maclise, R.A., and assuredly painted with the most independent disdain for either law or reason. Never has been seen so signal a failure in attempting to obtain repose by the introduction of so many sleeping figures. The appointment of parts to form the general whole, the first and last aim of every other painter, D. Maclise, R.A., has most gallantly disregarded. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 12, 1841 • Various
... crowded about the train. Two brown-robed Sisters stood like sentinels, one at either side, as she stepped into the car. I was conscious of a feeling that from the depths of their hoods they regarded me with un-Christian disdain. Through the windows I could see the students fluttering to seats, and the girl in gray seemed to be marshaling them. The gray hat appeared at a window for an instant, and a smiling face gladdened, I am sure, the guardians of the peace at St. Agatha’s, ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... the indomitable and independent energies of the natives of this part of the country are invaluable; dangerous when perverted. I shall never forget the fierce actions and utterances of one suffering from delirium tremens. Whether in its wrath, disdain, or its dismay, the countenance was infernal. I called once upon a time on a most respectable yeoman, and I was, in language earnest and homely, pressed to accept the hospitality of the house. I consented. The word to me was, 'Nah, Maister, ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell
... by Christian Science, which [1] appeals intelligently to the facts of man's spirituality, in- dividuality, to disdain the fears and destroy the discords ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... preoccupation of medieval philosophy seemed to be conjectures as to what would happen to man after death, and the entire system of thought was based on authority. The medieval philosopher turned in disdain from the arduous path of investigation of actual phenomena and confidently believed that he could find truth by easy reliance upon revelation and the elaboration of dogmas. A few brave minds rebelled against this unnatural imprisonment of the intellect, with the usual ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... have again and again advised you to turn that invaluable curiosity of yours—curiosity, a quality which Mr. Matthew Arnold so justly views with high esteem—into wider and nobler channels. Disdain the merely personal; accept the calm facts of domestic life as you find them; approach the broader and less irritating problems of Sociology (pardon the term) ...
— The Mark Of Cain • Andrew Lang
... possession of the vacant enclosures. The castle and the cathedral became the nucleus of the Teutonic cities. Hamlets crept around the precincts of the sacred and the outworks of the secular building: but it was long before the Lord Abbot or the Lord Chatelain regarded with any feelings but disdain, the burgher who exercised his trade or exposed his wares in the narrow lanes of the town which abutted on his domains, and ...
— Old Roads and New Roads • William Bodham Donne
... the indifference of Ferdinand, her passion for whom was by this time no secret in the family; and that, with a view to countenance this affectation, he should upon all occasions treat her with an air of loftiness and disdain. ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... think it is worth while," she muttered, turning sullenly and eyeing me from the middle of her pillows with disdain and ill-temper. ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... his eye And nostril beautiful disdain, and might And majesty, flash their full lightnings by, Developing in that one glance the ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... His darling pleasures, and his favour'd swains, Sigh'd in her absence, sigh'd when she was near, Now big with hope, and now dismay'd with fear; At length with falt'ring tongue he press'd the dame, For some returns to his unpity'd flame; But she disdain'd his suit, despis'd his care, His form unhandsome, and his bristled hair; Forward she sprung, and with an eager pace The god pursu'd, nor fainted in the race; Swift as the frighted hind the virgin ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... electric thing, that had perhaps expired from out me. Perchance, too, it would have dropped ye dead. Perchance ye need it not. Down lances! And now, ye mates, I do appoint ye three cup-bearers to my three pagan kinsmen there —yon three most honorable gentlemen and noblemen, my valiant harpooneers. Disdain the task? What, when the great Pope washes the feet of beggars, using his tiara for ewer? Oh, my sweet cardinals! your own condescension, that shall bend ye to it. I do not order ye; ye will it. Cut your seizings and draw the poles, ye harpooneers! Silently obeying ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... a lion born and bred in captivity is more difficult to train than one caught from the jungle. Then he gives rein to his fancy. "Such a lion does not fear man; he knows his own power. He regards man as an inferior, with an attitude of disdain and silent hauteur." "He accepts his food as tribute, and his care as homage due." "He is aristocratic in his independence." "Deep in him—so deep that he barely realizes its existence—slumbers a desire for freedom and an ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... mamma, "now we can really say that we are in Paris." The shops claimed the ladies' attention one by one. They passed with disdain the cafes radiant with mirror and gold, where the selfish men were drinking absinthe and playing at dominoes. It had always been the creed of Sophonisba's mamma that men were selfish creatures, and she had come to Paris only to see that she was right. They passed ...
— The Cockaynes in Paris - 'Gone abroad' • Blanchard Jerrold
... in great disdain. "I'll show you!" and he led Roderick, with his sucker, right into the best parlour, where the fireplace was, and showed ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... but neither could it occur to me as necessary to state on our Proceedings every little aid which I could thus procure, nor do I know how I could have stated it, without appearing to court favor by an ostentation which I disdain, nor without the chance of exciting the jealousy of my colleagues by the constructive assertion of a separate and unparticipated merit, derived from the influence of my station, to which they might ...
— The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... the chamber, turning the matter over in his mind. Aye, he would use the lad should the need arise. Why scruple? Had he ever received aught but disdain and scorn at the ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... Francesco Sforza had the courage (1450) to refuse the triumphal chariot which had been prepared for his return to Milan, on the ground that such things were monarchial superstitions. Alfonso the Great, on his entrance into Naples (1443), declined the wreath of laurel, which Napoleon did not disdain to wear at his coronation in Notre-Dame. For the rest, Alfonso's procession, which passed by a breach in the wall through the city to the cathedral, was a strange mixture of antique, allegorical, and purely comic elements. The car, drawn by four white horses, ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... her cheek against her lightly-clasped hands and sighed deeply to provoke a continuation of her brother's growling disdain. ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... General had tied up in the stable. They would make spears and each would get on a ram. Harry would let them out into the lot and they would have "a real charge—sure enough." But Margaret received the plan with disdain, until Dan, at Chad's suggestion, asked the General to read them the tournament scene in "Ivanhoe," which excited the little lady a great deal; and when Chad said that she must be the "Queen of ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... before him, and Sturk looked at the back of the volume with a leisurely disdain, but finding no title there, returned to the recipe. They both stared on his face, without breathing, while he conned it over. When he came about half-way, he whistled; and when he arrived at the end, he frowned hard; and squeezed his lips ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... pain Of stern denials, Nor with low-born disdain Augment our trials. Hearts just as pure and fair May beat in Belgrave Square As in the lowly air Of Seven Dials! Blue blood! Blue blood! Of what avail art thou To serve me now? Though dating from the Flood, ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... flow'ry spot, For which they never toil'd nor swat; They drink the sweet and eat the fat, But care or pain; And, haply, eye the barren hut With high disdain. ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... repose of his last moments, sought, by the terrors of his sentence, to extort repentance; but his behaviour, firm and dignified to the end, repelled their insulting advances with scorn and disdain. He was prouder, he replied, to have his head affixed to the prison-walls, than to have his picture placed in the king's bed-chamber: 'and, far from being troubled that my limbs are to be sent to your principal cities, I wish I had flesh enough to be dispersed through Christendom, to attest ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... woo'd me, he was but a youth: Frae his lips flow'd the strains o' persuasion and truth; His suit I rejected wi' pride an' disdain, But, oh! wad he ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... orders, however, and managed to get quite a hundred-weight of good cabin biscuit into the launch, while the cook was directed to fill his coppers with pork. I got some of the latter raw into the boat, too; raw pork being food that sailors in no manner disdain. They say ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... in hand, Americans all; By uniting we stand, dividing we fall. To die we can bear, but to serve we disdain, For shame is to freedom more dreadful than pain. In freedom we're born, in freedom we'll live. Our purses are ready: steady, boys, steady, Not as slaves but as ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... accompanied by her elder daughter, and Georgiana was left with her father. Not a word was spoken between them. He sat behind his newspaper till he went to sleep, and she found herself alone and deserted in that big room. It seemed to her that even the servants treated her with disdain. Her own maid had already given her notice. It was manifestly the intention of her family to ostracise her altogether. Of what service would it be to her that Lady Julia Goldsheiner should be received everywhere, if she herself were to be left without a single Christian ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... zest, to her fine intuition of nature and joy. The refusal to possess (even her best-beloved books never bore her own name, and her beautiful bevelled wardrobes were found empty through sheer giving), the disdain for every form of property, only intensified her delight in all the beautiful things which could be shared with others. No one ever possessed, in the true sense of passionate enjoyment, as Gabrielle Delzant possessed, for instance, the fine passages of Corneille, ...
— Hortus Vitae - Essays on the Gardening of Life • Violet Paget, AKA Vernon Lee
... crushed, I went into the night, I clutched my gleaming coin so tight. No, no, I could not well believe That any one could so deceive. I tried again and yet again— Contempt, suspicion and disdain; Always the same reply I had: "Get out of this. Your ...
— Ballads of a Bohemian • Robert W. Service
... princess, he gazed into her eyes, but the glance he received in return was calm and cold. Yolanda was rich, red wine, hot and strong; the princess was cold, clear water. The one was exhilarating, at times intoxicating; the other was chilling. The face of the princess, though beautiful, was touched with disdain. Every attitude was one of dignity and hauteur. Her words, though not lacking intelligence, were commonplace, and her voice was that of her father's daughter. Yolanda was a girl; the princess was a woman. The metamorphosis was complete, and ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major
... have not yet discovered him. The Christian population (God save the mark!) were forbidden by law to bear arms, and they were cowards by tradition. Villagers of the two races lived peacefully enough together, though there was an open disdain on the one side always and a ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray
... lavished on such men! God gives them all For some high end; and thus the seeming waste Of her rich soul—its starlight purity, Its every feeling delicate as a flower, Its tender trust, its generous confidence, Its wondering disdain of littleness,— These, by the coarser sense of those around her Uncomprehended, may not all ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... in a less degree when he is overtaken by illness or love or drink, or has met with any other disaster. But when he comes to a character which is unworthy of him, he will not make a study of that; he will disdain such a person, and will assume his likeness, if at all, for a moment only when he is performing some good action; at other times he will be ashamed to play a part which he has never practised, nor will he like to fashion and frame ...
— The Republic • Plato
... crafty and insidious animal vulgarly termed a statesman." But he insists that the truly wise statesman in pressing his ideal must always practise considerable accommodation. If he cannot carry the right he will not disdain to ameliorate the wrong, but, "like Solon, when he cannot establish the best system of laws, he will endeavour to establish the best that the people can bear."[168] Turgot made too little account, he thought, ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... and furious hurl'd against the ground His sceptre starr'd with golden studs around: Then sternly silent sat. With like disdain The raging ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... worked, with an apron covering her gown and her sleeves rolled up, was like an ice-box, and the naked babies when laid on the scales shrieked like demons. One male child, I remember, sat up perfectly straight and bellowed his protest with an insistent fury and a snorting disdain at all attempts to placate him that betokened the true son of France and a lusty long-distance recruit for the army. All the children, in fact, although their mothers were unmistakably poor, looked remarkably ...
— The Living Present • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... therefore, as we had filled up our water, &c., a proposition was made by him, to the second lieutenant and myself, to cruise under both flags, the American and Carthagenian, and this to be kept a profound secret from the crew, until we had sailed from port. Of course, we rejected the proposition with disdain, and told him the consequence of such a measure, in the event of being taken by a man-of-war of any nation,—that it was piracy, to all intents and purposes, according to the law of nations. We refused to go out in the privateer, if he persisted in this most nefarious act, and we heard no more ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... of the throne of God: For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds." Blessed are they that can endure all these things, shame, reproach, contumely, and disdain, persecutions and afflictions that attend the testimony of Jesus! Blessed are they that can endure the cross, and despise the shame! It is an internal cross, which thou must endure for Christ, or ...
— A Sermon Preached at the Quaker's Meeting House, in Gracechurch-Street, London, Eighth Month 12th, 1694. • William Penn
... inclin'd to wish, the Queen had met with a Fortune more worthy of her Birth and Virtue. Nor are the Manners, proper to the Persons represented, less justly observ'd, in those Characters taken from the Roman History; and of this, the Fierceness and Impatience of Coriolanus, his Courage and Disdain of the common People, the Virtue and Philosophical Temper of Brutus, and the irregular Greatness of Mind in M. Antony, are beautiful Proofs. For the two last especially, you find 'em exactly as they are describ'd by Plutarch, from whom certainly Shakespear copy'd 'em. ...
— Some Account of the Life of Mr. William Shakespear (1709) • Nicholas Rowe
... emblem of man's all-containing soul; Shall he make fruitless all Thy glorious pains, Delving within Thy grace an eyeless mole? Make me the least of Thy Dodona-grove, Cause me some message of Thy truth to bring, Speak but a word through me, nor let Thy love Among my boughs disdain to ...
— Arbor Day Leaves • N.H. Egleston
... to the situation of lady's maid. This advancement quite spoiled her; she was prouder than her mistress, and gave herself ten times more airs, and when, at first, my father (who as coxswain was constantly up at the house) offered to speak to her, she turned away from him in most ineffable disdain. Now my father was at that time about thirty years of age, and thought no small beer of himself, as the saying goes. He was a tall, handsome man, indeed, so good-looking that they used to call him ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... both houses that a young fellow should go to Columbia or Harvard, read law, and then lapse into more or less cultivated inaction. The only essential was that he should live "like a gentleman"—that is, with a tranquil disdain for mere money-getting, a passive openness to the finer sensations, one or two fixed principles as to the quality of wine, and an archaic probity that had not yet learned to distinguish between private and ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... the stanzas of my theme Will not, preserved by kindly Fate, Perish absorbed by Lethe's stream. Then it may be, O flattering tale, Some future ignoramus shall My famous portrait indicate And cry: he was a poet great! My gratitude do not disdain, Admirer of the peaceful Muse, Whose memory doth not refuse My light productions to retain, Whose hands indulgently caress The bays of ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... easily how the poor girl must have been bewildered and hurt at her reception in that household—envied for her past while delivered defenceless to the tender mercies of people without any fineness either of feeling or mind, unable to understand her misery, grossly curious, mistaking her manner for disdain, her silent shrinking for pride. The wife of the "odious person" was witless and fatuously conceited. Of the two girls of the house one was pious and the other a romp; both were coarse-minded—if they may be credited with any mind at all. The rather numerous men of ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... invasion of my country, plotted a long time in advance and carried out before the real operations of the war had begun, there was a wide gulf, a gulf that I never thought the Imperial Government capable of leaping over with a light heart, because of the European complications which so reckless a disdain for treaties would not fail ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... usually given them. These diminutive beings were known as long ago as the days of Homer, and their legendary combats with the cranes are spoken of by him in his poems. He was not aware of what is known now, that these forest dwarfs would disdain the cranes as antagonists, and are quite capable of overcoming the lordly elephant. In truth, they know no equals in the forest, and, while destitute of any knowledge of agriculture, are the most skilful, considering the primitive ...
— Man And His Ancestor - A Study In Evolution • Charles Morris
... strange life that had thrown him amongst men whom safety itself made it necessary to command despotically, partly from the habit of power and disdain of the world, his nature was incrusted with a stern imperiousness of manner, often approaching to the harsh and morose, though beneath it ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... to the highest pitch. I transcribe an epitome of the speech, which will be seen to have bristled with galling ridicule: "As to the gentleman's cruel sarcasm, I hope he will not be too severe. The contempt of that large-minded gentleman is so wilting, his haughty disdain, his grandiloquent swell, his majestic supereminent, overpowering turkey-gobbler strut, has been so crushing to myself and all the members of this House that I know it was an act of the greatest temerity for me to enter upon a controversy with him." ...
— Shadow and Light - An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century • Mifflin Wistar Gibbs
... the heart of the proud and patriotic little aristocrat, true daughter of a nation great enough to disdain small economies, and not accustomed to do without any luxury to which it is attached, that appealed to Mr. Price, pleasing the pride of race with which we contemplate any evidence of strength in our fellow-creatures, whether it be strength of purpose or ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... bear yourself like a goddess, and disdain me from Olympian heights," he said. "I had the wit to guess it ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... service, and from many forms of taxation; they also could exercise minor forms of jurisdiction. They formed, therefore, an intermediate class. Since Germany, as a whole, afforded them no proper sphere of political activity, the more ambitious did not disdain to take service with Austria or Prussia, and, to a less extent, even with the smaller States. It was possible, therefore, for the Queen's mother, a Princess of Saxe-Coburg, to marry the Prince of Leiningen without losing caste. Her ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... fine a mind, Transcendent grace and beauty, all combin'd Must justify my love and seeming boldness. I ne'er accused you of disdain or coldness. I duly honour maidenly reserve.— Your favour I pretend not to deserve; But who would not risk all, with blindfold eyes,— To win a heaven on earth,—a Paradise? Each day do we not see, for smaller gain, Great captains brave the dangers of the main? For glory's empty bubble thousands ...
— Turandot: The Chinese Sphinx • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... certain. A hundred dollars was better than nothing. It would take him to Chicago and enable him to live in comfort for a while. Besides, he might multiply it many times at the gaming table, for Tom Burns had been a gambler in his day. He certainly did not propose to disdain the sum which fortune had placed in his way because ...
— A Cousin's Conspiracy - A Boy's Struggle for an Inheritance • Horatio Alger
... it would be incapable of doing it, was it uncultivated. Every nation is then obliged by the law of nature to cultivate the ground that has fallen to its share. Those people, like the ancient Germans and modern Tartars, who, having fertile countries, disdain to cultivate the earth, and choose to live by rapine, are wanting to themselves, and deserve to be exterminated as savage ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... is unworthy of a reply, citizen," replied Droulde quietly; "my services to the Republic are well known. I should have thought that the Committee of Public Safety would disdain an anonymous denunciation against a faithful servant of ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... he can act," said Ruth thoughtfully. "Not many of these handsome screen heroes can do that. But perhaps if Wonota did not disdain him so much (and she does, secretly) she could ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson
... of Israel; the ordinary effects of nature wrought more admiration in them than in the other all His miracles: surely the heathens knew better how to join and read these mystical letters, than we Christians, who cast a more careless eye on these common hieroglyphics, and disdain to suck divinity from the flowers of nature. Nor do I so forget God as to adore the name of nature; which I define not with the schools, to be the principle of motion and rest, but that straight and ...
— Sir Thomas Browne and his 'Religio Medici' - an Appreciation • Alexander Whyte
... dear Lady Disdain, are you yet living?" And now war broke out afresh between them, and a long jangling argument ensued, during which Beatrice, although she knew be had so well approved his valor in the late war, ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... were at the risk of life, and deliver the Divine message. They had to use every device to make it telling, striking in at every opportunity and giving line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little. They did not disdain the homeliest means, if it served the purpose. A prophet would go about in public carrying a yoke on his neck, like a beast of burden, or lie a whole year on his side, to attract attention to some important ...
— The Preacher and His Models - The Yale Lectures on Preaching 1891 • James Stalker
... Belden with a proud defiance. Many a night had Truesdale's courses wet her pillow with tears of sorrow and shame; she now wondered if it were really she herself who had just celebrated his profligacy, and had seemed to glory in it at that. She had surmised her son's disdain for the importunities of Gladys McKenna, and she had joined with him in a ringing derision when the Beldens had accused him of encouraging her in her folly that he might employ her as a spy upon the happenings in their house. "My son," she concluded, "will return at his own pleasure, ...
— With the Procession • Henry B. Fuller
... to kiss her hand, if she shall coily recoil, and signify your repulse, you are to re-enforce yourself with, "More than most fair lady, Let not the rigour of your just disdain Thus coarsely censure of your servant's zeal." And withal, protest her to be the only and absolute unparallel'd creature you do adore, and admire, and respect, and reverence, in this court, corner of the ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson
... of comparing Dickens and Thackeray existed in their own time, and no one will dismiss it with entire disdain who remembers that the Victorian tradition was domestic and genuine, even when it was hoodwinked and unworldly. There must have been some reason for making this imaginary duel between two quite separate and quite amiable acquaintances. And there is, after all, some reason for ...
— The Victorian Age in Literature • G. K. Chesterton |
