Free translatorFree translator
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Faint-hearted   Listen
adjective
Faint-hearted  adj.  Wanting in courage; depressed by fear; easily discouraged or frightened; cowardly; timorous; dejected. "Fear not, neither be faint-hearted."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Faint-hearted" Quotes from Famous Books



... and has to some seemed a premonition of disaster. Before the last outbreak of the Connecticut militia, Master Graycoat haunted the outskirts of the weather-beaten and bedraggled camp, and, I doubt not, saw much of that preparation that sent that regiment of faint-hearted onion-gatherers to flaunt their woes and their wrongs in the face of ...
— Thankful Blossom • Bret Harte

... they are tired of each other." No, I do not advocate that anyone should accept a failure. I advocate that every human being should do all that is possible—more perhaps than is possible without the grace of God—to make marriage the noble and lovely thing it should be. I think those are faint-hearted who easily accept the fact that it is difficult, and from that drift swiftly to the conclusion that for them it is impossible. I advocate that the greatest faith and loyalty should be practised. I believe ...
— Sex And Common-Sense • A. Maude Royden

... gold was simply to be shovelled into bags and carted to Sydney. But when they came upon the scene, and saw that in the case of most of them it would only be after weeks and months of severe and constant toil that they could be rich, they grew faint-hearted, lounged for a week or two on the diggings, and then started for home again; so that, for some time, there was a counter-current of grumbling and discontented men passing back to Sydney by the road. These men thought themselves befooled by Hargraves, ...
— History of Australia and New Zealand - From 1606 to 1890 • Alexander Sutherland

... for men to overcome, according to the maxim which had hitherto guided Mr Rawlings and Seth Allport, and which they had preached to the more faint-hearted members of their party; and, Ernest Wilton was a thorough disciple of their creed, for he was not one to be daunted by obstacles, no matter how grievous and apparently insurmountable they were;—no, ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson

... to make the poor chaps buckle to their tramp again, and it was as much as Magellan and I could do to get them to start. One of them, Denis Brown, he was a faint-hearted man even on board ship, entreated us to let him lie down there and die where he was; but of course we would not leave him behind, and he had to come on with us whether he liked it or not, Magellan and I forcing him on his legs and ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson

... are the smirched. Queen Honor is the spotless. We slept thro' wars where Honor could not sleep. We were faint-hearted. Honor was full-valiant. We kept a silence ...
— General William Booth enters into Heaven and other Poems • Vachel Lindsay

... she would.) She knew where the purple violets and the white innocence first flecked the spring turf, and where the ground-sparrows hid their mottled eggs. All the little waddling, downy goslings, the feeble chickens, and faint-hearted, desponding turkeys, that broke the shell too soon, and shivered miserably because the spring sun was not high enough in the morning to warm them, she fed with pap, and cherished in cotton-wool, and nursed and watched with eager, happy eyes. O blessed Ivy Geer! True Sister of Charity! Thrice ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... restored the military reputation of their country before the eyes of Europe. To have forged such an instrument of war was no mean administrative exploit. To have maintained its efficiency steadily on the whole, though sometimes with a faint-hearted parsimony, and to have loyally supported its commander against the cavils of a factious opposition superior in parliamentary ability, for a period of seven years, must be held to redeem the tory government from the charge of ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick

... great majority of the Mexican people. Such policy, if only followed in time, would have so strengthened the hands of Maximilian that, in all probability, he would have been able to hold his ground when most unchivalrously abandoned by his faint-hearted ally. No doubt the anti-president claimed that he was a reformer of the church. And surely, indeed, he was, if it was reform to suppress all religious societies whatsoever, to rob the clergy of their property, and that so completely as to reduce them to mendicancy. ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell

... wakings I should not see the pale gleam of death-fires, and where foul stenches would not half stifle me the whole night long. And it was not until I had eaten my scant supper, and because of the comfort that even that little food gave me felt more disposed to cheerfulness, that in a weak faint-hearted way I began to hope again that perhaps the run of luck against me had come to ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier

... request, he went out of his way to visit our village. We promised to conduct him to the Mandans, and to bring him safely back to his fort. And now you talk of {58} abandoning him, because you fear the Sioux. This must never be. Let those of you who are faint-hearted remain here in camp with the women; but let those who are without fear follow our father.' After this scornful eloquence there was no ...
— Pathfinders of the Great Plains - A Chronicle of La Verendrye and his Sons • Lawrence J. Burpee

... with you. But there will be those who will say that the attempt might be made,—who will accuse us of being faint-hearted because we ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope

... minutes before noon the public vote was taken; one or two faint-hearted members sought a craven's refuge and slunk quietly from the chamber. As each name was called, the deputy rose in his place and gave his vote, there was ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor

... accustom'd career of thy sires is the same As the eaglet's to soar with his eyes on the sun; Whose nobility comes to thee, stamp'd with a seal Far, far more ennobling than monarch e'er set; With the blood of thy race offer'd up for the weal Of a nation that swears by that martyrdom yet! Shalt thou be faint-hearted, and turn from the strife, From the mighty arena, where all that is grand, And devoted, and pure, and adorning in life Is for high-thoughted spirits like thine to command? Oh no! never dream it; while good men despair Between tyrants and traitors, and timid men bow, Never think for ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy

... within him, hearing it, and he said to himself: "If my father and mother were but here to see it!" And he sang again— and still for the poor, and the weary, and the sick, and the faint-hearted, until the street became as silent as a church where the minister is saying, "Glory be unto the Father." And indeed it was just then a sacred temple, where a sacred voice was preaching in a most ...
— My First Cruise - and Other stories • W.H.G. Kingston

... the enemy, since, as we have already seen, it was the Greek belief that the spirits of the dead found no rest till their obsequies had been performed. Such preparations did not daunt the spirits of Leonidas and his men, and his wife, Gorgo, not a woman to be faint-hearted or hold him back. Long before, when she was a very little girl, a word of hers had saved her father from listening to a traitorous message from the King of Persia; and every Spartan lady was bred up to be able to say to those she best loved that they must come home from ...
— The Junior Classics • Various

... at first have seemed a worthier and wiser successor to his splendid father. As a child, even, he had shown himself to be no faint-hearted creature. When the great Civil War broke out he had joined his father's army. It met with disaster at Edgehill, and was finally shattered by the crushing defeat of Naseby, which afterward inspired ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr

... combatants as they go into position are not made up of heroes, and regiments which won renown in such scenes of carnage as Fredericksburg, or Gettysburg, or the Wilderness, were composed of plain, quiet men, who were faint-hearted and homesick when forming in front of flashing batteries or heavy bodies of opposing troops. It was only when completely involved in the struggle, after the madness of excitement had overcome the real man, ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, February, 1886. - The Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 2, February, 1886. • Various

... to hold the election resulted in such mobs and tumult that it was forbidden to be held by a faint-hearted Free State mayor, and was consequently adjourned to Easton. The Free State printing press of Mark Delahay was, during these troubles, destroyed. At Easton, a mob undertook to break up the election, but was driven off, and in the affray ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler

... greatness of Sparta, was admiral of the Greek fleet, but yet was faint-hearted in time of danger, and willing to weigh anchor and set sail for the Isthmus of Corinth, near which the land army lay encamped; which Themistocles, resisted; and this was the occasion of the well-known words, when Eurybiades, to check his impatience, told him that at the ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch

... marks in the damp soil? Here have been his hoofs,—and there is a moccasin print, as I'm a sinner! The owner of the beast has tried hard to move him from the place, but it is in the instinct of the creatur' to be faint-hearted and ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper

... the commencement of October. On the 8th of that month Balbi wrote to Casanova that a whole night devoted to labour had resulted merely in the displacing of a single brick, which so discouraged the faint-hearted monk that he was for abandoning an attempt whose only result must be to increase in the future the rigour ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini

... "Don't be faint-hearted, old chap! I'll haul you up. It won't be so tough presently. You're through the worst already. Hold ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell

... clear before the day of judgment (or some stage of being which that expression may serve to symbolize) is reached. But the faithful fighters of this hour, or the beings that then and there will represent them, may then turn to the faint-hearted, who here decline to go on, with words like those with which Henry IV. greeted the tardy Crillon after a great victory had been gained: "Hang yourself, brave Crillon! we fought at Arques, and you were ...
— The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James

... that it began its work before men were ripe for freedom—to lead its votaries into the path of spiritual life and growth. Confronted by the uncompromising dogmatism of Rome, it had to devise a counter dogmatism of its own in order to rally round it the faint-hearted who, though eager to absolve themselves from obedience to the despotism of the Church, yet feared to walk by their own "inward light." In making this move, which was not the less false because it was in a sense inevitable, ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes

... sister say to her brother in the adjoining room, that she could not bear the chaplain, David Ludeck, for he had been visiting there off and on for ever so long, and yet never had asked her the question. He was a faint-hearted coward evidently, and she ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V1 • William Mienhold

... "you are faint-hearted enough to deny him. You have not the courage to be proud of his love; you must, ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... Glost. Faint-hearted Wooduile, prizest him 'fore me? Arrogant Winchester, that haughtie Prelate, Whom Henry our late Soueraigne ne're could brooke? Thou art no friend to God, or to the King: Open the Gates, or ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... his apartment he communicated what he had heard to Amelia and Mrs. Ellison, not disguising his apprehensions of the enemy's intentions; but Mrs. Ellison endeavoured to laugh him out of his fears, calling him faint-hearted, and assuring him he might depend on her lawyer. "Till you hear from him," said she, "you may rest entirely contented: for, take my word for it, no danger can happen to you of which you will not be timely apprized by him. And as for the fellow that had the impudence ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding

... cable calls for close thinking. How to try and help him to pump courage into faint-hearted fellows? How to do so without toning down my demands for reinforcements?—for evidently these demands are what are making them shake in their shoes. Here is my draft for an answer: I can't change my estimate: it was the least I could safely ask ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton

... fall sick and faint-hearted—whereupon, very orderly, with good discretion, they entreated me to regard the safety of mine own life, as well as the preservation of theirs; and that I should not, through overbouldness, leave their widows and fatherless children to give me ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude

... Germany licks the dust and is undeceived and stricken once for all." Her comments brought out the fact that she had followed European events very closely during the past thirty years, whilst her letters to her faint-hearted friends in Scotland showed her ...
— Mary Slessor of Calabar: Pioneer Missionary • W. P. Livingstone

... to say that faint-hearted word again, I'll take my ring off. What are we for but to grow better or grow worse? Do you think Arethusa French will be ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson

... as these will remain for a long while in the position that I have described. This was my own case. I became the plaything of two contending impulses; the desires of youth were always held in check by a faint-hearted sentimentality. Life in Paris is a cruel ordeal for impressionable natures, the great inequalities of fortune or of position inflame their souls and stir up bitter feelings. In that world of magnificence and pettiness ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac

... prize, sir, by your gracious leave," said Joe Hawkridge, addressing Captain Wellsby. "This is Mr. Peter Tobey, a poor, faint-hearted pirate like me. May I have him ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine

... science. Our eyes are bathed in Revelation, but upon our ears the music of the Word has not yet fallen. Until that time when the meaning of it all shall flash out upon the world, the race will be hidebound in callousness and in faint-hearted melancholy. As yet we do not know what to do with all which we know, and we are afflicted with the pessimism of inertia and the pessimism of dyspepsia. Intellectually, we have been living too high the last hundred years or so. In this is the secret ...
— The Kempton-Wace Letters • Jack London

... course he did!—then, as she retreated towards the open room-door, came the last outburst of her invectives, high-pitched in their voluble utterance, against him, against them both, against everybody, including Mr. Raddle in the kitchen—"a base, faint-hearted, timorous wretch, that's afraid to come upstairs and face the ruffinly creaturs—that's afraid to come—that's afraid!" Ending with her screaming descent of the stairs in the midst of a loud double-knock, upon the ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent

... faint-hearted in Mr. de la Mare's melancholy. His sorrow is idealist's sorrow. He has the heart of a ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd

... Atlas; I have no deep store of moral courage; I am absurdly sensitive, ill-fitted to cope with unpopularity and disapproval. Bitter, vehement, personal hostility would break my spirit. A fervent Christian might say that one had no right to be faint-hearted, and that strength would be given one; that is perfectly true in certain conditions, and I have often experienced it when some intolerable and inevitable calamity had to be faced. But it is an evil ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson

... and faint-hearted Irene submitted to pay you tribute. She ought to have made you pay tribute to her. Return to me all that she paid you; else the matter must be ...
— Famous Men of the Middle Ages • John H. Haaren

... blood, that both the open air, and wide fields are too narrow for him. Yea and tho he formerly had (especially by his Mistris) the name of behaving himself like a second Mars; yet now he'l play the sick-hearted, (I dare not say the faint-hearted) to the end he may, having put on his fine knotted Scarf, and powdered Periwig, only go to shew himself to that adorable Babe, his Lady Venus, Leaving oftentimes a desperate siege, and important State affairs, to accompany a ...
— The Ten Pleasures of Marriage and The Confession of the New-married Couple (1682) • A. Marsh

... she had made that even this shock did not set her to express any more faint-hearted doubts, and, when Lord Northmoor arrived the next day, the involuntary radiance on both their faces was token enough that they were all the world to each other. Mary allowed herself to venture on getting Lady Kenton's counsel on the duties of household headship that ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge

... to arms! Let the battle-cry rise, Like the raven's hoarse croak, through their ranks let it sound; Set their knell on the wing of each arrow that flies, Till the shouts of the free shake the mountains around; Let the cold-blooded, faint-hearted changeling now tremble, For the war-shock shall reach to his dark-centered cave, While the laurels that twine round the brows of the victors Shall with rev'rence be strew'd o'er the tombs of ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... forgive me!), and could not, forsooth, keep themselves alive for twelve months; so that Drake, coming back from his last West Indian voyage, after giving them all the help he could, had to bring the whole party home. And if you will believe it, the faint-hearted fellows had not been gone a fortnight, before I was back again with three ships and all that they could want. And never was I more wroth in my life, when all I found was the ruins of their huts, ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley

... horses, and to scare away half-famished wolves; in all of which, Jowler, notwithstanding his bad behaviour at the buffalo hunt, was expected to act a distinguished part. Black Tom was scarcely considered worth thinking about, he being too wild by half for a wild horse, and too faint-hearted for a grizzly bear. At one time, it was so far determined for him to play the part of a prairie-dog, that Austin set about digging a hole for him: before it was finished, however, the plan was abandoned; Brian ...
— History, Manners, and Customs of the North American Indians • George Mogridge

... this with so much warmth, and yet with so much assurance of our fate, that I began to think a little of the risk I was going to run. I had no more mind to be murdered than he; and yet I could not for my life be so faint-hearted in the thing as he. Upon which I asked him if he had any knowledge of the place, or had ever been there. He said, No. Then I asked him if he had heard or read anything about the people of this island, and of their ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe

... progressive and liberal. The total result is fairly beyond the reach of ordinary words of praise. It sets a pace that should result in wide-spread benefits to the wild life of North America. In it there is nothing faint-hearted. It should make some of our States think seriously regarding their own shortcomings in this ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday

... bull himself is faint-hearted! Then, indeed, the noble Spanish blood of the audience is aroused to fever pitch. "Otro toro! Otro toro"—"Another bull! bring another bull!"—rises from a thousand throats. Otherwise the other acts of the performance take their ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock

... if I could have helped it. We struggled on in this way for a day and a night, and then he said we were beyond the region of storms from land. I am afraid I should, if left to myself, linger always with the faint-hearted mariners who hug the shore, notwithstanding this great experience of finding our safety by steering boldly off from every thing wherein we had before considered our only security lay. After this, I performed every day the great exploit of climbing to the deck, and looking out at ...
— Life at Puget Sound: With Sketches of Travel in Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon and California • Caroline C. Leighton

... the head might contrive. In quickly conceived strategy he began to give pause in his attack, nay, he retreated a step or two. No scruples hampered his devices, no code of honor limited the means he would employ. Backing before his opponent, he seemed to Rudolf to be faint-hearted; he was baffled, but seemed despairing; he was weary, but played a more complete fatigue. Rudolf advanced, pressing and attacking, only to meet a defence as perfect as his own. They were in the middle of the room now, close by ...
— Rupert of Hentzau - From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim: The Sequel to - The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope

... of land.—The very next day such certain signs of land were seen that the most faint-hearted took courage. The men had already noticed great flocks of land-birds flying toward the west, as if to guide them. Now some of the men on one vessel saw a branch of a thorn-bush float by. It was plain that it had not long been broken ...
— The Beginner's American History • D. H. Montgomery

... on what we cannot help,' said Violet; 'let us do our best, and then leave it in the best Hands, and He will bring out good. You cannot think how much happier I have been since I knew it was wrong to be faint-hearted.' ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge

... kept on saying; "what do I want with luxuries? Ask Deborah if I care what I eat and drink; we shall do very well, if you and Esther are not so faint-hearted." And when we found out how our protests seemed to hurt him, we let him have his own way; only Allan and I exchanged looks, which said as plainly as looks could, "Is he not the best uncle that ever lived, and will we not work our hardest ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... was undismayed; as he had recuperated his physical powers under incredible hardships, so he sharpened those of his mind amid the greatest difficulties. His first care was to make sure of France. To a deputation of the servile senate he roundly denounced all faint-hearted civil officials as menacing the authority of law. "Timid and cowardly soldiers," he said, "may cost a nation its independence; faint-hearted officials, however, destroy the authority of the laws. The finest death would be that of the soldier on the field of ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... judge tried in vain to impart some of his own high spirits to his faint-hearted friend. He was brimming over with gladness at the thought of his marriage, which now seemed assured. After so long a separation he was about to see his betrothed, for he felt sore that she would come with her sister. Mr. Plateas had no such reasons for rejoicing. ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Polish • Various

... we are but faint-hearted crusaders, even the walkers, nowadays, who undertake no persevering, never-ending enterprises. Our expeditions are but tours, and come round again at evening to the old hearth-side from which we set out. Half the walk is but retracing our steps. We should go forth on ...
— Walking • Henry David Thoreau

... Adieu! faint-hearted instrument of lust; That falselie hath betrayde our equale trust. Hence-forth no more will I implore thine ayde, Or thee, or ...
— The Choise of Valentines - Or the Merie Ballad of Nash His Dildo • Thomas Nash

... force would soon arrive from England, subject to his directions. At this very moment a ship of war, the Asia, lay anchored opposite the city; its grim batteries bearing upon it, greatly to the disquiet of the faint-hearted ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... least of his offences: for had he not offered his own son as a holocaust at the moment he felt himself most menaced by the league of Israel and Damascus? Among the people themselves there were many faint-hearted and faithless, who, doubting the power of the God of their forefathers, turned aside to the gods of the neighbouring nations, and besought from them the succour they despaired of receiving from any other source; the worship of Jahveh was confounded ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 8 (of 12) • G. Maspero

... with the armed men of the Duke's body-guard, boisterously laughing, with their hands on their sides, or kicking over the mock throne covered with white cloth, the coils of rope, the axes of painted wood, and the other properties of this very faint-hearted Fehmgericht. ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett

... "'Sail on!' as Joaquin Miller has Columbus say to the faint-hearted sailing master. 'The North Pole or bust!' is my ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman

... insidious and shameless, Ungrateful, faint-hearted and wicked; At heart we are cold, sterile eunuchs, ...
— The Shield • Various

... Russian Baltic provinces were formerly flourishing seats of German culture. The German element in Austria, our ally, is gravely menaced by the Slavs; Germany herself is exposed to a perpetual peaceful invasion of Slavonic workmen. Many Poles are firmly established in the heart of Westphalia. Only faint-hearted measures are taken to-day to stem this Slavonic flood. And yet to check this onrush of Slavism is not merely an obligation inherited from our fathers, but a duty in the interests of self-preservation and European ...
— Germany and the Next War • Friedrich von Bernhardi

... her. It told her that, despite anything anyone might presume to urge to the contrary, God was ever the loving Father of His children; that He rejoiced when they rejoiced, suffered when they sorrowed; however much the faint-hearted might be led to believe that the world was ruled by remorseless law, that much faith and a little patience would enable even the veriest sinner to see how the seemingly cruellest inflictions of Providence were for the sufferer's ultimate good, ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte

... assault on the revenues of the Church; the subsequent crusade against the House of Lords; the display of intellect and courage exhibited by Lord Lyndhurst in that assembly, when all seemed cowed and faint-hearted; all these were incidents or personal traits apt to stir the passions, and create in breasts not yet schooled to repress emotion, a sentiment even of enthusiasm. It is the personal that interests mankind, that fires their imagination, ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli

... fight this thing like men," he cries, in that deep, din- conquering voice that has served the Ingerfields in good stead on many a steel-swept field, on many a storm-struck sea; "there must be no cowardly selfishness, no faint-hearted despair. If we've got to die we'll die; but please God we'll live. Anyhow, we will stick together, and help each other. I mean to stop here with you, and do what I can for you. None ...
— John Ingerfield and Other Stories • Jerome K. Jerome

... like all the joys of humanity, love is unequally distributed, and that it is a thing which no amount of desire or admiration or hope can bring about, unless it is bestowed. Even in the case of the faint-hearted lover, so mercilessly lashed in Prisoners, who will pay a call to see the beloved, but will not take a railway journey for the same object, is it not the physical vitality that is deficient? I do not quarrel with the transcendental treatment of love; I only say ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson

... frantic gestures, the arms swinging wildly—and then the body shoots off into frightful space, plunging upon the pavement with a revolting thud. The man's arm strikes a bystander as he darts down. The crowd shudders, sways, and utters a low murmur of pity and horror. The faint-hearted lookers-on hide their faces. One woman ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein

... sad days, when he gave himself up for lost, and when God seemed to have forsaken him, and forgotten his promise. He was a man of like passions with ourselves; and therefore he was, as we should have been, terrified and faint-hearted at times. But exactly what God was teaching and training him to be, was not to be fainthearted— not to be terrified. He began in his youth by trusting God. That made him the man after God's own heart, just as it was the want of trust in God which made Saul ...
— Sermons on National Subjects • Charles Kingsley

... more,—the blind girl, weak and weary! A voice seemed crying from that grave so dreary, "What wouldst thou do, my daughter?"—and she started, And quick recoiled, aghast, faint-hearted; But Paul, impatient, urges evermore Her steps towards the open door; And when, beneath her feet, the unhappy maid Crushes the laurel near the house immortal, And with her head, as Paul talks on again, Touches the crown of filigrane Suspended from the low-arched portal, No more restrained, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... I have but offered myself: you have your choice. I can pass on. Yes, I know well I speak to Nevil Beauchamp; you have drilled me to trust you and your word as a soldier trusts to his officer—once a faint-hearted soldier! I need not remind you: fronting the enemy now, in hard truth. But I want your whole heart to decide. Give me no silly, compassion! Would it have been better to me to have written to you? If I had written I should have clipped my glorious impulse, brought myself ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... and face the world you will find it looks like a great, fierce giant. But really its fierce look is caused by a false-face that it wears to frighten faint-hearted people. You go boldly up and take hold of his beard, as David faced the giant, and you will be surprised to find that not only the beard but the whole mask comes off in your hands, and there is a kindly countenance behind. For the world would ...
— Fifty-Two Story Talks To Boys And Girls • Howard J. Chidley

... had probably winced under the satire of Frances Power Cobbe, and trembled before the annually swelling lists of suffrage petitions. Single-handed they saw they were helpless against this incoming tide of feminine persuasiveness, and so it seems they called a meeting of faint-hearted men, and bound themselves together by a constitution and by-laws to protect the franchise from the encroachment ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... the wakato[u] Kohei she is fastened to a door, and from the rear the scoundrel sets them adrift. Fishing at Ombo[u]bori, Iemon sees them float by. From Yotsuya to Sunamura is a very great distance. It would occupy a woman's legs for the space of a day; or faint-hearted fellows, water drinkers, such of the kind as would try it. Winding along what rivers, by what intersecting canals had they floated here? In no way does one conceive. All the more the reasons influencing the author's design are not known. Very interesting is the story, ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville

... say that!" And the tough, rough man showed a grain of feeling. He soon recovered himself, though, and said more obstreperously than ever, "If they are, I disown 'em. None of your faint-hearted people for me. I despise a chap that gives in before eighty. I'm Ben Bolt, that is bad to beat. Death himself isn't going to bowl me out ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade

... down as a faint-hearted, dubious-couraged counter-jumper from the East; he saw now that there was something ...
— Deadwood Dick, The Prince of the Road - or, The Black Rider of the Black Hills • Edward L. Wheeler

... hair must have floated like this, I expect, on the day when you wished to die. And it must have been its splendour that would not suffer such a catastrophe. I wonder, dear, that you should have wished that, you who are so faint-hearted in ...
— The Choice of Life • Georgette Leblanc

... been this virulent feeling against them, so foreign to the easy-going and tolerant British nature, I would confess that I think the real reason was fear. Not fear of them individually, of course- -our foulest detractors have never called us faint-hearted—but fear of their star, fear of their future, fear of the subtle brain whose plans always seemed to go aright, and of the heavy hand which had struck nation after nation to the ground. We were but a small country, with ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... weak, exhausted, feeble, languid, wearied, faded, half-hearted, listless, worn, faint-hearted, ill-defined, purposeless, worn down, ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... degrees of humidity, and the cup of endurance would have been filled to overflowing and toiling humanity breathing something like sheer moisture. The sky was heavy and gray, and a dull sun, as though it too had been rendered faint-hearted, was painfully struggling against the ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum

... uniformity revealed by statistics may be reversed when resolute men and women, possessed of higher ideals, unite to resist it. Jacob A. Riis holds that these evils are not by a decree of fate, but are the result of positive wrong, and he dedicates his "Ten Years' War" as follows—"to the faint-hearted ...
— Euthenics, the science of controllable environment • Ellen H. Richards

... is, that he has not the means with which to assist the poor, as their father which he is, and all are grieving over this. Will your Majesty encourage him to continue with holy zeal in the future and not to become faint-hearted on account of poverty; and surely it is poverty to be an archbishop in ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVII, 1609-1616 • Various

... beyond the mountains. Those first frontiersmen had still a touch of the timidity of the Old World in their blood: they lacked the frontier heart. They were "Pilgrims" in very fact,—exiled, not at home. Fine courage they had: and a steadfastness in their bold design which it does a faint-hearted age good to look back upon. There was no thought of drawing back. Steadily, almost calmly, they extended their seats. They built homes, and deemed it certain their children would live there after them. But they ...
— Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools - Edited With Notes, Study Helps, And Reading Lists • Various

... calling to the mob, they assailed the city. [19] It is said that they saw over the gate opposite the Parian (which they were about to attack) a crucified Christ dripping blood, and at His feet the seraphic father, St. Francis, with face uplifted toward Him. On this account they became so faint-hearted that they were forced to retire, without being observed from the city, as it was night. Those in Quiapo set fire to it and burned it. They killed some natives, whose moans and cries were heard on the city walls. At this juncture day dawned, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XIV., 1606-1609 • Various

... faint-hearted, but lifted her little feet as well as she could and followed him. He led her on in the white, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various

... in my heart beside Daniel. Both abide with me bringing atonement and purification, mediators with the cry of "Sursum corda!"—When the day comes for Death to approach, he shall not find me unprepared or faint-hearted. Our faith hopes for and awaits the deliverance to which it leads us. Yet as long as we are upon earth we must attend to our daily task. And mine shall not lie unproductive. However trifling it may seem to others, to me ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated

... unusual with Greene is displayed in the verse, pointing to hasty production. But the whole play is humorous, vigorous and healthy. George's man, Jenkin, a dull-witted, faint-hearted fellow, is the clown. There is an abundance of incident, though not the complexity of Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay. We have noticed the historical atmosphere repeated from that play and from James the Fourth. With regard to the love-plot, Bettris has only a small part, ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne

... to seek your wife," said Emmeline, stoutly; "I shall think you faint-hearted if you ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope

... very earnestly. "It's such a mistake. Honestly, I don't think you've anything to be sorry for. So don't let yourself be faint-hearted! I know he's not a ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell

... hearing the rumpus, came running up to see the fun, and they laughed and danced over poor Little Moccasin's distress. Often afterward they called him "coffee-cooler"; which meant that he was cowardly and faint-hearted, and that he preferred staying in camp around the fire, drinking coffee, to taking part in the manly sports of hunting and ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... into the covers and quietly sobbed herself to sleep. The huge and silent land appalled her. She had been chucked neck and crop into the primitive, and she had not yet been able to react to her environment. She was neither faint-hearted nor hysterical. The grind of fending for herself in a city had taught her the necessity of self-control. But she was worn out, unstrung, and there is a limit to a ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... feelings, but at last gave up, and ringing for the cook, directed her to broil a couple of thin slices of ham very nicely, make a good cup of tea, and a slice or two of toast. When this was ready, it was sent in to Mrs. Warburton. It came just in time, and met the excited appetite of the faint-hearted invalid. It was like manna in the wilderness, and revived ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur

... safely completed the trip were composed of several men, adding much to the safety of the expedition, as a whole. Others had boats much lighter than ours, a great help in many respects. Speaking for myself, I was just a little faint-hearted, and not a little overawed as we prepared to return to ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb

... as to his flight. "Why did I flee? Assuredly I cannot tell, but of one thing I am sure, the fear of death was not the chief cause of my fleeing," he wrote to Mrs. Bowes from Dieppe. "Albeit that I have, in the beginning of this battle, appeared to play the faint-hearted and feeble soldier (the cause I remit to God), yet my prayer is that I may be restored to the battle again." {40a} Knox was, in fact, most valiant when he had armed men at his back; he had no enthusiasm for taking ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang

... was precisely because of my want of theatrical experience, which left me rather in the position of one of the public than one of the players, and there was much grave head-shaking over it, especially on the part of our excellent stage-manager, Mr. Bartley, who was exceedingly faint-hearted about the experiment. ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble

... worshippers, or throw them into despair. Men must have a God, who is both irritable, and placable. If his anger frightens some timorous souls, his clemency encourages the resolutely wicked, who depend upon recurring, sooner or later, to the means of accommodation. If the judgments of God terrify some faint-hearted pious persons, who by constitution and habit are not prone to evil, the treasures of divine mercy encourage the greatest criminals, who have reason to hope they participate therein ...
— Good Sense - 1772 • Paul Henri Thiry, Baron D'Holbach

... young noble laughed with gay scorn: "Tears would be in all respects a better answer than I should deserve, should I whimper faint-hearted words into a maiden's ear. What folly-fit do you speak in, fellow? What! Do you think I would wed another comrade like yourself, or a playfellow like this youngster?" Ever so gently his foot touched the boyish form on the step. "It ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz

... congratulate women on the progress of this reform during a quarter of a century, we urge them not to grow discouraged or faint-hearted when obstacles arise in their attack upon hoary wrongs. We remind them that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, and that the nearer we come to victory the stronger will be the effort against us. But our cause is one ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... 4 And say unto him: Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither be faint-hearted for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin with Syria, and of ...
— The Book Of Mormon - An Account Written By The Hand Of Mormon Upon Plates Taken - From The Plates Of Nephi • Anonymous

... am delighted that you are going. Our little time here has been delightful, but we had reached its limit. I like to think that you are going back into the thick of it. Don't be faint-hearted, Lawrence. Don't lose faith in yourself. You have chosen a terribly lonely path; if any man can find his way to the top, you can. And don't dare to forget ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... side? I do not pretend to understand Jasper Ewold's or Mary Ewold's thoughts. She has preferred to make another generation's ill-feeling her own in a thing that concerns her life alone. She has seen enough of you to know her mind. For, from all I hear, you have not been a faint-hearted lover. Is it fair to her to follow her back to the desert? Is it the courage of self-denial, of control of impulse on your part? Would your mother want you to persist in a veritable conquest by force of your will, whose strength you hardly realize, against Mary Ewold's sensibilities? ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer

... promising fortune but my design in seeking only such as would voluntarily go along with me was that I might be certain of your affection and resolution, and since you are they whom I ought only to rely upon in my present circumstances and danger, I shall now tell you that I was never so faint-hearted as to quit my inheritance without attempting what is possible for any man in my capacity. In order to this I feigned this design for Ireland for three reasons; first, to put my uncle in security, whom I have found ever hitherto very circumspect and well guarded; next, to find out ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie

... coming thus god-like through the greenwood, admired and trembled; and Dankwart whispered a word of caution to his dark-browed brother. But the old chief's face grew gloomier than before; and he scowled fiercely upon the faint-hearted Dankwart, as he hoarsely whispered ...
— The Story of Siegfried • James Baldwin

... none of the old customs of the island put in practice, understand that. We want to save the ship if we can, or the lives of those on board. Come, lads, they are fellow-creatures— seamen like ourselves, in distress. Where is the faint-hearted coward who would leave them to perish without lifting a hand to save them. Such a fellow is not to be found among ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston

... told him not to be faint-hearted but to follow his ideal. And by the delight in his own romantic fancy, and by the harmonies of nature, ‘the warble of water,’ and ‘cataract music of falling torrents,’ the inspiration of the poet was renewed. His Eclogues and English Idyls ...
— Old Familiar Faces • Theodore Watts-Dunton

... sickness and pain! Stevenson writing in a sickbed stories and essays that help one to endure the blows of fate is a spectacle such as this world has few to offer. So the man's life and work have come to be a constant inspiration to those who are faint-hearted, a call to arms of all ...
— Modern English Books of Power • George Hamlin Fitch

... he would at least cease to observe, to heed, or to care for what Miss Garland and Roderick might do or might not do together. Nevertheless, some three days afterward, the opportunity presenting itself, he deliberately broached the subject with Roderick. He knew this was inconsistent and faint-hearted; it was indulgence to the fingers that itched to handle forbidden fruit. But he said to himself that it was really more logical to be inconsistent than the reverse; for they had formerly discussed these mysteries very candidly. Was it ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James

... of the blessing. For this very reason that which brings to such unworthy ones so great a blessing is a divine testament, by which God desires above all things to awaken love to Him. So Christ comforted those dejected ones who thought the blessing too great and said: "Faint-hearted little flock, fear not; it hath pleased your Father to give you the ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther

... faint-hearted!" exclaimed the baroness. "To be sure these men that storm cities, and fire cannon, and cut and hack one another with so much spirit, are poor creatures compared with us when they have to lie quiet ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade

... He had become faint-hearted, and every day invented some new excuse for not leaving. One day it was that there were not enough camels and horses to carry the necessary provision; the next, that the country through which they must pass was infested by blacks; the next, that he waited for his ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various

... boatswain, springing up and catching him by the sleeve; "I'll give it to you in writing. Come, you ain't faint-hearted? Why, a bluejacket 'ud do it for the fun o' the thing. If I give it to you in writing, and there should be an accident, it's worse for me than it is for you, ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs

... getting faint-hearted there, and I would fan the flame of this revolution into such a blaze that the eyes of all kings in Europe shall be blinded. If martial law is passed they will need me all the more there. There is no limit, it seems, to the ...
— Vera - or, The Nihilists • Oscar Wilde

... Thorhall, 'that it is not good for any faint-hearted man to live at my place, on account of the hauntings that have been of late, and I do not wish to deceive you in ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang

... proffer," said the prince, "the provost of the lists shall cut thy bowstring, break thy bow and arrows, and expel thee from the presence as a faint-hearted craven." ...
— Eighth Reader • James Baldwin

... exercised its gracious office of giving color to flowers and courage to the faint-hearted, even in favor of the agent. He declared himself ready to accompany Anton upon the terms proposed. Accordingly, under the protection of the great cockade upon his companion's hat, Anton hurried from house to house, pale indeed from loss of rest, but with an undaunted heart. ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... the Gauls and threw them into great disorder. As Pyrrhus, however, marched in by the street called Kylarabis, his soldiers raised a warlike shout: and he, noticing that the shout was echoed by the Gauls in the market-place in an undecided, faint-hearted fashion, at once guessed that they were being hard pressed. He instantly pressed the horsemen with him to charge, which they did with great difficulty, as the horses kept falling into the water-courses with which the whole ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long

... all the mischief—the books of their demented friend. The curate asked the niece for the keys to the library, and she was only too willing to let him have them. They all went in, followed by the housekeeper, who grew faint-hearted as soon as she caught sight of all the beautifully bound books in the room. She ran out as if beset, returning immediately with a bowl of holy water and a sprinkler, with which she implored the curate to sprinkle the room, so that none of the magicians ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... the most faint-hearted, for it was now apparent that this was not a movement in which Stockbridge was alone engaged, not a mere local revolt, but a general, popular uprising, whose extent would be its justification. And yet, prepared as they thus were, to find a goodly number of sympathizers ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy

... Alice Fletcher gives in the Journal of the American Folk Lore Society (1889, 219-26) an amusing instance of how far a present-day Omaha girl may go in resenting a man's unwelcome advances. A faint-hearted lover had sent a friend as go-between to ask for the girl's favor. As he finished his speech the girl looked at him with flashing eyes and said: "I'll have nothing to do with your friend or you either." The young man hesitated a moment, as if about to repeat ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck

... murmurs were, however, occasionally heard at the steadfastness of the magistrates, and a dead body was placed at the door of the burgomaster, as a silent witness against his inflexibility. A party of the more faint-hearted even assailed the heroic Adrian Van der Werf with threats and reproaches as he passed through the streets. A crowd had gathered around him, as he reached a triangular place in the centre of the town, into which ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... sluggards awake! Beat, drums, till the roofs of the faint-hearted shake! Yet, yet, ere the signet is stamped on the scroll, Their names may be ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... not lead all parents to this result; for on the other hand, there are strong, very strong objections to such a course. The trial in either case is great; but it is one that must be met, not evaded. It is wise to count the cost, but it is treason to be faint-hearted; for the trial, after all, cannot weigh much in the balance against the eternal interests of the dying heathen. HOW MUCH WORSE IS THE CONDITION OF MILLIONS ...
— Thoughts on Missions • Sheldon Dibble

... at humanity seem to have been rather faint-hearted, as the following passage from Mr. Maguire's "Irish in America," showing how they were carried out, and how inadequate was the remedy ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... I would have of thee a—" Her eyes grew bright with laughter, a dimple played wanton in her cheek, and Sir Pertinax was all suddenly abashed, faint-hearted and unsure; thus, looking down, he chanced to espy a strange jewel that hung tremulous upon her moving bosom: a crowned heart within a ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol

... a very depressing effect upon the followers of Dost Mahomed, who, although still at the head of an army of 14,000 men, found that there was no courage in his faint-hearted followers, and that they could not be trusted even to be true to himself. His position being thus hopeless, Dost Mahomed fled from Cabul on the 2nd of August, and that city was entered in state by Shah Soojah, who then, though for a ...
— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston

... would you have had me take such sunshine, faint-hearted recreants to my bosom at our first acquaintance? No—no; I reserved my friendship for those who deserved it, for those who undauntedly bore me company, in despite of difficulties, dangers, and fatigues. And now, as to those who adhere to me at present, I take them ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving

... meaning of their words, trusting that definiteness, frankness, and honesty may offer a better chance of mutual understanding, and serve as a stronger bond of union between man and man, than vague formulas, faint-hearted reticence, and what is at the root of it all, want of true love of Man, and of ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller

... work wonders. They nerved the courage of these distressed Freibergers, until the most faint-hearted among them rose into a hero. Let the Swedes renew their assault on the next day as fiercely as they pleased; let them summon the town three times over to surrender, and make all their preparations for a final attack; nothing could now take away the joyful assurance of immediate relief. ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous

... difference between the methods of enforcement of the blockade on the New England coast and on the Southern seaboard was due to definite orders from the British admiralty: for the Southern States had entered into the war heart and soul; while New England gave to the American forces only a faint-hearted support, and cried eagerly for peace at any cost. So strong was this feeling, that resolutions of honor to the brave Capt. Lawrence were defeated in the Massachusetts Legislature, on the ground that they would encourage others to embark in the needless war in which Lawrence lost ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot

... that evening to be delivered into the hands of his new master. In putting into execution his bold resolve, he secreted himself, and so remained for three weeks. In the meantime his mother, who was a slave, resolved to escape also, but after one week's gloomy foreboding, she became "faint-hearted and gave the struggle over." But Joseph did not know what surrender meant. His sole thought was to procure a ticket on the U.G.R.R. for Canada, which by persistent effort he succeeded in doing. He ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still

... however, Mr. Drake had in his adversity grown fearful and faint-hearted, and had begun to doubt whether he had a right to keep her. And of course he had not, if it was to be at the expense of his tradespeople. But he was of an impetuous nature, and would not give even God time to do the thing that needed time to be done ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald

... see where he had made a huge error in not playing his part more cleverly. It was this girl Jeanne who had shot him. It was Jeanne who had stood over him in that last moment when he had made an effort to use his pistol. It was she who had tried to murder him and who had turned faint-hearted when it came to finishing the job. But his knowledge of these things he should have kept from her. Then, when the proper moment came, he would have been in a position to act. Even now it might be possible to cover his blunder. He leaned ...
— The Flaming Forest • James Oliver Curwood

... and precautions. The temper of the two, as they front each other in Saul's tent, shows that the one has lost, and the other received, the Spirit which strengthens. David has become the encourager, and his cheery words bring some hopefulness to the gloomy, faint-hearted king. The Septuagint has a variant reading in verse 32, which brings this out and suits the context, 'Let not my lord's heart fail.' But, whether this be adopted or no, David appears as quite unaffected by the terror which ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... into her own kitchen, under the impression that my aunt was mad. My aunt being supremely indifferent to Mrs. Crupp's opinion and everybody else's, and rather favouring than discouraging the idea, Mrs. Crupp, of late the bold, became within a few days so faint-hearted, that rather than encounter my aunt upon the staircase, she would endeavour to hide her portly form behind doors—leaving visible, however, a wide margin of flannel petticoat—or would shrink into dark corners. This gave my aunt such unspeakable ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... thou sullen and yet faint-hearted slave," answered Varney, with bitterness, "that no MURDER as thou callest it, with that staring look and stammering tone, is designed in the matter? Wert thou not told that a brief illness, such as woman ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott

... who is of my type among men not bind his heart; in those spring-times and many-hued meadows shall he not believe, who knoweth the fickly faint-hearted human species! ...
— Thus Spake Zarathustra - A Book for All and None • Friedrich Nietzsche

... no land, for all the signs and eager watching. Leagues of undulating weeds, but no land! And the faint-hearted sailors grumble again. They fear that they never shall "meet in these seas with a fair wind to return to Spain." A head-wind heartens them, but it quickly flits off laden with kisses for Andalusian sweethearts; and again the ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot

... "De-juiced" was a permissible epithet. There were men with an overweening sense of their importance, manifestly annoyed and angry to find themselves still disengaged, and inclined to suspect a plot, and men so faint-hearted one was terrified to imagine their behaviour when it came to an interview. There was a fresh-faced young man with an unintelligent face who seemed to think himself equipped against the world beyond all misadventure by a collar of exceptional ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells

... person is yourself; and no man can finish a task before he begins it. We'll grant there's a chance for failure—a million chances; but don't try to count them. Count the chances for success. Don't be faint-hearted, for there's no such thing as fear. It doesn't exist. It's merely an absence of courage, just as indecision is merely a lack of decision. I never saw anything yet of which I was afraid—and you're a man. The deity of success is a woman, and she insists on being won, not ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach

... content with a humble lot; no honour must seem to high for her to strive for; she must go with me gladly a-viking; war-weed must she wear; she must egg me on to strife, and never wink her eyes where sword-blades lighten; for if she be faint-hearted, scant honour will befall me." Is it not ...
— The Vikings of Helgeland - The Prose Dramas Of Henrik Ibsen, Vol. III. • Henrik Ibsen

... replied Shaggy. "This Nome King is really a powerful fellow and has a legion of nomes to assist him, whereas our bold Queen commands a Clockwork Man and a band of faint-hearted officers." ...
— Tik-Tok of Oz • L. Frank Baum

... thrown into disorder to recover form; whereas, it is difficult to keep horses in line, and impossible if once they be thrown into disorder to reform them. Moreover we find that with horses as with men, some have little courage and some much; and that often a spirited horse is ridden by a faint-hearted rider, or a dull horse by a courageous rider, and that in whatever way such disparity is caused, confusion and disorder result. Again, infantry, when drawn up in column, can easily break and is not easily broken by cavalry. This is vouched, not only by many ancient and many modern instances, ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli

... Leif that he had been too faint-hearted in his explorations of Wineland. "You were bolder than Biorn, I grant you," he said; "but you only nibbled at the rind after all. I promise you I will dig down deeper ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett

... vows with cool complacency, but would only stay a minute, and would only talk of her master and mistress, toward whom her heart was really warming in their trouble. She spoke hopefully, and said: "'Tisn't as if he was one of your faint-hearted ones as meet death half-way. Why, the second day, when he could scarce speak, he sees me crying by the bed, and says he, almost in a whisper, 'What are you crying for?' 'Sir,' says I, ''tis for you—to see you lie ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade

... Wriothesley, was, I give you my word, the first faint-hearted conception of myself and three companions," said Beauchamp, laughing, as he welcomed that lady and Miss Chipchase; "but you see people have been kind to us, and that we are more popular in society than ...
— Belles and Ringers • Hawley Smart

... "Do not be faint-hearted, dear," said her lover, tenderly, although a shade of anxiety swept over his face as he spoke. "I am going immediately to look up that woman with whom Giulia Fiorini told you she boarded, and ascertain what evidence ...
— The Masked Bridal • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... successfully against its local usurping oppressor, for independence. Fidelity to our principles and institutions demands that we PREVENT such interference by solemnly proclaiming that the laws of nations and humanity SHALL BE PRESERVED inviolate and sacred. In the performance of this duty the faint-hearted may falter; the domestic despot and cold diplomatist may linger behind; the man of world-extended and fearful traffic may hesitate; but the warm and great heart of the American masses will feel no moment of hesitation and doubt in defence of truth. The great Author of nations will find ...
— Select Speeches of Kossuth • Kossuth



Words linked to "Faint-hearted" :   cowardly, fearful, fainthearted



Copyright © 2024 Free Translator.org