"Firmness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... I expected would have produced in Europe an unfavorable opinion of our political state. But it has not. On the contrary, the small effect of these tumults seems to have given more confidence in the firmness of our governments. The interposition of the people themselves on the side of government has had a great effect on the opinion here. I am persuaded myself that the good sense of the people will always be found to be the best army. ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... had not regained, quite, the firmness and tone it had had before he was shot down at Solis Lacus, but he had recovered greatly from the bloated flabbiness of a few days ago. Most of that had been water in his tissues, and resumption of normal physical activity had wrung it out in ...
— Rebels of the Red Planet • Charles Louis Fontenay
... is to understand by the firmament that was made on the second day, not that in which the stars are set, but the part of the atmosphere where the clouds are collected, and which has received the name firmament from the firmness and density of the air. "For a body is called firm," that is dense and solid, "thereby differing from a mathematical body" as is remarked by Basil (Hom. iii in Hexaem.). If, then, this explanation ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... the brilliant cavalry-officer and the calculating banker. His talent for organization was marvellous; no statesman has ever compelled alliances, no general has ever collected an army out of unyielding and refractory elements with such decision, and kept them together with such firmness, as Caesar displayed in constraining and upholding his coalitions and his legions; never did regent judge his instruments and assign each to the place appropriate for him ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... by the presence of an illustrious descendant of New England, the Chief Magistrate of the Nation. [Cheers.] He is about retiring from his high position, with the respect, admiration and the gratitude of the people for the great wisdom, the pure purpose, the steady will and the unwavering firmness with which he has administered the government, preserved its honor and secured its property. [Loud cheers.] I propose to you, as our first toast, 'The President of ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... another—if we fail now in this our plain duty as a nation, then the ship of state is in more peril from this ground-swell on which we are riding than it was during the fierce tempest of war. I trust that this Congress will have the firmness and wisdom to guide the old ship safely into the haven of peace and security. This we can do by fixing our eyes upon the guiding star of our fathers—the equal ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... lands desolated, their homes filled with mourning, it is not surprising that the Athenians were seized with rage and despair, or that they vented their anger on Pericles, whom they deemed the author of their misfortunes. But that statesman still adhered to his plans with unshaken firmness. Though the Lacedaemonians were in Attica, though the plague had already seized on Athens, he was vigorously pushing his schemes of offensive operations. A foreign expedition might not only divert the popular mind ...
— A Smaller History of Greece • William Smith
... They chose for president a sergeant-major in the 4th Dragoons, a greybeard of the army, an excellent military subject, and a good man. He took the most serious view of his functions, visited us both, and reported our replies to the committee. Mine was of a decent firmness. I told him the young lady of whom Goguelat had spoken had on several occasions given me alms. I reminded him that, if we were now reduced to hold out our hands and sell pill boxes for charity, it was something very new for soldiers of the Empire. We had all seen bandits ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... sent by Heaven. In that same country there was a heaven in which love had placed all the glory I could desire; such was the beauty of Luscinda, a damsel as noble and as rich as I, but of happier fortunes, and of less firmness than was due to so worthy a passion as mine. This Luscinda I loved, worshipped, and adored from my earliest and tenderest years, and she loved me in all the innocence and sincerity of childhood. Our parents were ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... fixed lines to a fixed end. On the contrary, I think that his fame is brightened by his willingness to follow, that he might—as he did—surpass his predecessors; and that his glory is increased by the resolute firmness with which he played up to his destiny. Holding fast to his great purpose to find a passage to the East by the North, he compelled every one of Fate's deals against him—until that last deal—to turn in his favor; and even in that last deal ...
— Henry Hudson - A Brief Statement Of His Aims And His Achievements • Thomas A. Janvier
... accidentally entered; and the sudden appearance of this wretch it was, at the very moment of finding herself charged with so vile and degrading an offence, that contributed most of all to rob her of her natural firmness, by suddenly revealing to her terrified heart the depth of the conspiracy which thus yawned like a gulf below her. And not only had this sudden horror, upon discovering a guilty design in what before had seemed accident, and links uniting remote incidents which else seemed ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... is to wipe out the blood with which every street of Paris is now stained, and when will women cease to hand down to their children the envenomed hatreds of May, 1871? Where, above all, are the signs of that combined generosity, firmness and foresight in statesmen or soldiers which alone could lay the first stone of reconciliation? The prospect is too black for France and for Europe for us to dare look forward. We have no heart at present to balance the faults and crimes of the two sides, or to assign the relative blame. We ...
— The Insurrection in Paris • An Englishman: Davy
... him if he had not this thing and that, but he said with firmness, "Nothin' but shoes, guls. I did carry a gen'l line, one while, of what you may call ankle-wea', such as spats, and stockin's, and gaitas, but I nova did like to speak of such things befoa ladies, and now I stick ex-elusively to shoes. ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... disallowed, namely, that he "does not write without a thoughtful consideration of his subject," and also with novelty and freshness of view. "Generally," he says, "I claim (not arrogantly, but with firmness) the merit of rectification applied to absolute errors, or to injurious limitations of the truth." Another obvious quality of all his genius is its overflowing fulness of allusion and illustration, recalling his own description of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... over his pupils. A prime office of this guardianship is to take care lest language fall into loose ways; for words being the final elements into which all speech resolves itself, if they grow weak by negligence or abuse, speech loses its firmness, veracity, and expressiveness. Style may be likened to a close Tyrian garment woven by poets and thinkers out of words and phrases for the clothing and adornment of the mind; and the strength and fineness ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... with Mrs. Hanway-Harley; it was yet heavy upon him, and he could summon no courage for another. Then Dorothy became the heroine; she would inform Mrs. Hanway-Harley with her own young lips. This she did, bearing herself the while with much love and firmness, since Richard—quaking inwardly, but concealing his craven condition from Dorothy—supported ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... swelling buds and early flowers, gave way in its turn to the long bright days of summer. And now only a few weeks remained ere the annual examination at which Ida was to be graduated. Neither Rose nor Jenny were to return the next year, and nothing but Mr. Lincoln's firmness and good sense had prevented their being sent for when their mother first heard that they had failed to enter the ...
— The English Orphans • Mary Jane Holmes
... face was very pale, but there was a change in her voice, a sudden firmness, and a total ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... doubtful whether the native parish priest, bereft of the white man's control, would have sufficient firmness of character to overcome his own frailties and lead his flock in the true path. Under a Philippine hierarchy there would be a danger of the natives reverting to paganism and fetichism. There have been many indications of that tendency from years back up to the present. Only a minority of native ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... he was never tried), determined to see him before he left France for ever. The road from Cahors to Montpellier did not pass through Montauban, but a few miles to the east of it. Having spent the night in prayer to God, that He might endow her with firmness to sustain the trials of a scene, which was as heroic in her as it was touching to those who witnessed it, she went forth in the morning to wait along the roadside for the arrival of the illustrious body ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles
... things, which attended with a proportionate sense of the shortness and uncertainty of all below, while it prompts to activity from a conviction that "the night cometh when no man can work," produces a certain firmness of texture, which hardens us against the buffets of fortune, and prevents our being very deeply penetrated by the cares and interests, the goods or evils, of this transitory state. Thus this just impression of the ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... His eye wandered, and had no meaning in its wandering: this gave him an odd look, such as I never remembered to have seen. For a handsome and not an unamiable-looking man, he repelled me exceedingly: there was no power in that smooth-skinned face of a full oval shape: no firmness in that aquiline nose and small cherry mouth; there was no thought on the low, even forehead; no command in that ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... applying to him, as to a dying man, the beautiful French verses in which the Abbe Chaulieu, in expectation of his own death, laments his approaching separation from his friend the Marquis de la Fare. Mr. Hume's magnanimity and firmness were such, that his most affectionate friends knew that they hazarded nothing in talking or writing to him as to a dying man, and that, so far from being hurt by this frankness, he was rather pleased and flattered by it. I happened to come into his ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... mother were once more guests in the Ralstons' bungalow. Netta had desired to stay at the new hotel which—as also at Udalkland—native enterprise had erected near the Club; but Mrs. Ralston had vetoed this plan with much firmness, and after a little petulant argument Netta had given in. She did not greatly care for staying with the Ralstons. Mary was a dear good soul of course, but inclined to be interfering, and now that the zest of life was ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... Cleves, was surprised and afflicted not to have had so much as the pleasure to see her. The King's illness increased so much, that the seventh day he was given over by the physicians; he received the news of the certainty of his death with an uncommon firmness of mind; which was the more to be admired, considering that he lost his life by so unfortunate an accident, that he died in the flower of his age, happy, adored by his people, and beloved by a mistress he was desperately in love with. The evening before his death he caused Madame his ...
— The Princess of Cleves • Madame de La Fayette
... that there was no limit to which they would not go. Their last blanket or bead, the clothing on their backs, their wives and children, their own liberty were sometimes hazarded; and if the chances of the game went against them the penalty was paid with unflinching firmness. The delivery of the wagered wives, Lescarbot tells us, was not always accomplished with ease, but the attempt would be faithfully made and probably was often successful. Self-contained as these people ordinarily were, it is not a matter of surprise that the weaker ...
— Indian Games • Andrew McFarland Davis
... Aladin, with respect and firmness, "I receive with submission the sentence of my crime. It is dictated by circumstances; and were it not, I feel that the misery of having fallen under your disgrace would be worse to me. The sacrifice once made, I can repent of it no more. But the day will come, when your Majesty, regretting your ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... an effort, for apart from the fact that he was never a scholar there was the added uncertainty of his long disused right hand to be reckoned with; but at last he grasped the pencil with all the firmness he ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, October 31, 1917 • Various
... with prudent firmness as soon as they were conscious of the evil; they amended their laws, and they saved ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... is due to those officers who remained true despite the example of their treacherous associates; but the greatest honor and most important fact of all is the unanimous firmness of the common soldiers and common sailors. To the last man, so far as known, they have successfully resisted the traitorous efforts of those whose commands but an hour before they obeyed as absolute law. This is the patriotic instinct of plain people. They understand without an argument that the ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Lincoln - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 6: Abraham Lincoln • Compiled by James D. Richardson
... lower strata composed of the rough material from which the Grand Council was made up by selections or choice of the brighter and more shining lights,—persons whose political views were up to the standard of treason, whose qualifications of intellect, shrewdness, cunning, caution, promptness, and firmness of purpose fully met the requirements of this degree of the order. The Supreme Council was composed of the Supreme Commanders—the ruling spirits of the order. This council was the body, therefore, from which all important ...
— The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details • I. Windslow Ayer
... delight we had been to. I could have lain so for hours, but for that excitable prick of mine, whose sensibilities were far too rapidly set in motion by the luscious pressures of that most delightful cunt in which it lay engulphed. It had gradually resumed its pristine firmness, and was now at full stand, throbbing impatiently for further combats. I began to move. ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... the very jaws of death to gain the coveted vantage ground, and again and again the blue lines, torn, battered and well-nigh crushed to earth, re-formed and hurled back the assault. Dash and daring were met by courage and firmness, and at nightfall, though the Confederates had gained some ground, their opponents still held their original position. Both sides had paid dearly, however, for whatever successes they had gained, the Union ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... the ground he had won for three days and a half, and only retired on account of the exhaustion of his troops, and after carrying off over 6000 prisoners, much cannon, and other trophies. He allowed that Rosecrans had displayed much firmness, and was "the only man in the Yankee army who was not badly beaten." He showed me, on a plan, the exact position of the two armies, and also the field of operations of the renowned guerillas, Morgan ...
— Three Months in the Southern States, April-June 1863 • Arthur J. L. (Lieut.-Col.) Fremantle
... In spite of all temptation, we preserved Religiously that vow; but firmness failed, Nor were we ever ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... that Parliament must be judged by its own conduct. If its acts were unjust, bigoted, and rash, no excuse can save it from condemnation. If, on the other hand, it acted with firmness and loyalty towards its king—if it did much to secure the rights, the prosperity, and the honour of the nation—if, in a country where property had been turned upside down a few years before, it strove to do justice to the many, with the least possible injury to the few—if, in a country torn with ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... sheath. These hastily laid batches of eggs, expelled perhaps by the exigencies of an ovary incapable of further delay, seem to me in serious danger; for the seed in which the grub must establish itself is as yet no more than a tender speck of green, without firmness and without any farinaceous tissue. No larva could possible find sufficient nourishment there, unless it waited for the pea ...
— Social Life in the Insect World • J. H. Fabre
... apparatus must work together in entire harmony. We hear of teachers who seem to specialize on some one part of the anatomy to the exclusion of other parts. They are so particular about the diaphragm, for instance; that must be held with exactly the right firmness to support the tone. That is all very well; but what about the chest, the larynx, the throat, the head and all the rest of the anatomy? The truth is the whole trunk and head of the body are concerned in the act of tone production; ...
— Vocal Mastery - Talks with Master Singers and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... would be well introduced into our own legislative assembly. Ladies, indeed, would no longer peep down through the ventilator; but we should have more sense and fewer words. It is also to tobacco that is to be ascribed the stoical firmness of those American warriors, who, satisfied with the pipes in their mouths, submitted with perfect indifference to the torture of their enemies. From the well-known virtues of this weed arose that peculiar expression ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... citizens. This treaty is important, because it opened the door for the peoples of the world to a country which has since proved to be possessed of vast wealth and resources. Captain Perry received high praise for his firmness and diplomacy in the conduct ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... fear, I recalled to your memory your former public professions and conduct, and endeavoured to paint, in the strongest colours, the fatal consequences, that would ensue from such an example, particularly to the militia; that if officers, (more especially one in your station,) discovered a want of firmness, we could not reasonably expect private soldiers to remain in the field; and added, that as I was commanding officer there, I should not pass over such expressions in future; appearing to be invigorated by these remonstrances, your subsequent conversation induced ...
— Nuts for Future Historians to Crack • Various
... began to approach the old house, which, with its many gray gables, put on a new aspect from this point of view. Redclyffe admired its venerableness anew; the ivy that overran parts of it; the marks of age; and wondered at the firmness of the institutions which, through all the changes that come to man, could have kept this house the home of one lineal race for so many centuries; so many, that the absence of his own branch from it seemed but ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... to put extracted teeth in some place where they will be found by a mouse or a rat, in the hope that, through the sympathy which continues to subsist between them and their former owner, his other teeth may acquire the same firmness and excellence as the teeth of these rodents. For example, in Germany it is said to be an almost universal maxim among the people that when you have had a tooth taken out you should insert it in a mouse's hole. To do so with a child's milk-tooth which has ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... influence of Mendelssohn, whose friendship ended only with his death, of David, Schumann, Liszt, Berlioz, and Brahms, who was largely indebted to Joachim for the introduction of many of his works to the public, brought out the thorough uprightness, firmness of character and earnestness of purpose, and that intense dislike of all that is artificial or untrue in art, which have made him a great moral power in ...
— Famous Violinists of To-day and Yesterday • Henry C. Lahee
... this alteration in their manners was at first delightful to Piedro; but in proportion to his credit, his opportunities of defrauding increased; and these became temptations which he had not the firmness to resist. His old manner of ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... assuming a look of firmness and composure, "tell me the truth I beseech you. I cannot bear this dreadful suspense. What misfortune has befallen my child? Let me know the worst, and I will endeavour to bear ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson
... wanted them to pay a good price for having made a comparison, quite right in the main, but odious to me in the extreme. The same reason, doubtless, prevented me from giving them back their book, which I had no earthly right to keep, and which they asked me in vain to return to them. My firmness and my threats, and perhaps also the fear of the police, made them think themselves lucky to get off with their jewel-box. As soon as they were gone the ladies, like the kindly creatures they were, began to pity them. "You might have given them back their ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... explained that the carver belonging to the mess- room could not be found. The steward, present also, complained savagely of the cook. The fellow got things into his galley and then lost them. Mr. Franklin tried to pacify him with mournful firmness. ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... will be found, in the sequel, to have been equally adverse to the prosperity of their trade and to the probity of the directors."[81] Yet, though still petitioners for their charter, the directors had the firmness to resist this influence, and resolved Not to employ any gentleman in any place of charge, requesting to be permitted to sort their business with men of their own quality, lest the suspicion of employing gentlemen ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... moved to the left gave us by their action the same kind of an impulse which they would have furnished if they had begged us with words, or if they had ordered us to follow them with authoritative firmness. In each of these cases, the influence would have amounted to a suggestion. Whether we watched the movements of other people or whether their words made an impression on us, in either case the way became prepared for a certain line of action and therefore ...
— Psychotherapy • Hugo Muensterberg
... stream of clear, sweet, rich melody, with the apparent ease of a bird. Undismayed by the traditions of Mali-bran, Pasta, and Sontag in this character, she gave the part a new reading, in which she put something of her own intense individuality. "By the firmness of her step, and the general confidence of her deportment," said a contemporary writer, "we were at first induced to believe that she was not nervous; but the improvement of every succeeding song, and the warmth with which she gave the latter part of the ...
— Great Singers, Second Series - Malibran To Titiens • George T. Ferris
... move. The colonel felt his chest slowly collapsing, but steadied himself against a chair, and endeavored to beam with chivalrous gallantry not unmixed with magisterial firmness upon ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... right when he declared that whatever heights and depths there may be in God's great revelation, and however needful it is for a complete apprehension of the truth as it is in Jesus that these should find their place in the creed of Christendom, still the firmness with which that initial truth of man's sinfulness and his forgiveness and acceptance through simple faith in Christ is held, and the clear earnestness with which it is proclaimed, are the test of a ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... tradition is a great help and support, giving a strength, or firmness, or dignity to our life which it would ...
— Sermons at Rugby • John Percival
... face, which had been a plump and dimpled one before the changes which had come to pass, seemed to shine out of her as she said these words; and when she dried her eyes, and shook her head and her handkerchief at Tugby, with an expression of firmness which it was quite clear was not to be easily resisted, Trotty said, 'Bless her! ...
— The Chimes • Charles Dickens
... in themselves still utterly insufficient for the task of managing their children. They have in themselves neither the wisdom, nor the patience, nor the long-suffering, nor the gentleness, nor the meekness, nor the love, nor the decision and firmness, nor anything else that may be needful in dealing with their children aright. But their heavenly Father has all this. The Lord Jesus possesses all this. And they are in partnership with the Father, and ...
— The Life of Trust: Being a Narrative of the Lord's Dealings With George Mueller • George Mueller
... you consider her culpable, if you cannot see in her either debility of spirit or an absence or feebleness of moral sense, you will do your duty with firmness. You will remember that for justice to be done chastisement will not alone suffice, but that punishment must be in ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure
... to be highly pleased with his nephew, Pelias entertained him sumptuously for five days, during which time all was festivity and rejoicing. On the sixth, Jason appeared before his uncle, and with manly firmness demanded from him the throne and kingdom which were his by right. Pelias, dissembling his true feelings, smilingly consented to grant his request, provided that, in return, Jason would undertake an expedition for him, ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens
... transported, if he did not conform in three months; and then, if found as a Nonconformist, in this country, he should be hung. Determined at all hazards not to be a traitor to his God, he anticipated being hung; and was anxious, in such a cause, to meet death with firmness. When his fears prevailed, he dreaded lest he should make but a scrabbling shift to clamber up the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... of a truly great man are united in Columbus. Genius, labor, patience, obscurity of origin, overcome by energy of will; mild but persisting firmness, resignation toward heaven, struggle against the world; long conception of the idea in solitude, heroic execution of it in action; intrepidity and coolness in storms, fearlessness of death in civil strife; confidence in the ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... aiming drill," command of execution "Squad (platoon, or company) Ready." At the command "Ready" each man faces half right and carries the right foot about 1 foot to the right, in such a position that will insure the greatest firmness and steadiness, raises the piece and drops it into the left hand at the balance, left thumb along the stock, muzzle at the height of the breast. If kneeling or sitting the position of the piece is similar—if kneeling the ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker
... heavy. But when she talked, it flashed into sudden life, and you found yourself watching her mouth, fascinated. It was the key to her whole character, that mouth. Mobile, humorous, sensitive, the sensuousness of the lower lip corrected by the firmness of the upper. She had large, square teeth, very regular, and of the yellow-white tone that bespeaks health. She used to make many of her own clothes, and she always trimmed her hats. Mrs. Brandeis used to bring home material and styles ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... attempt to take a further step; not to fly from life, but to mingle with it, and yet to grow to be not dependent on it. The Stoic ideal was a high one, to cultivate a firmness of mind that was on the one hand not to be dismayed by pain or suffering, and on the other to use life so temperately and judiciously as not to form habits of indulgence which it would be painful to discontinue. The weakness of Stoicism was ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson
... verse, he looked up at her again, and a half mocking smile played in his eyes. Again he sounded the note, a challenge. And this time, as at his bidding, she began to sing. The flute instantly swung with a lovely soft firmness into the song, and she wavered only for a minute or two. Then her soul and her voice got free, and she sang—she sang as she wanted to sing, as she had always wanted to sing, without that awful scotch, that impediment inside her own ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... I hope, my Lord?" said Dorriforth, with a firmness in his voice, and with an eye so fixed, that his antagonist hesitated for a moment in want of a reply—and Miss Milner softly whispering to him, as her guardian turned his head, to avoid an argument, he bowed acquiescence. And then, as if in compliment to her, he changed the ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald
... woman with a gentle voice and an appearance and demeanor indicative of a general softness of disposition; but beneath this mild exterior there was a great deal of firmness of purpose. Asaph had not seen very much of his sister since she had grown up and married; and when he came to live with her he thought that he was going to have things pretty much his own way. But it was not long before he entirely changed ...
— A Chosen Few - Short Stories • Frank R. Stockton
... send him on his business without noise or scandal, and I'd hold a seance, too, with Mistress Elsin, wherein a curtain-lecture should be read, kindly, gravely, but with firmness fitting! ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... had for many years given me hopes that we should go together and visit the Hebrides. In spring, 1773, he talked of coming to Scotland that year with so much firmness that I hoped he was at last in earnest. I knew that if he were once launched from the metropolis he would go forward very well. Luckily, Mr. Justice (now Sir Robert) Chambers conducted Dr. Johnson from London to Newcastle; and Mr. ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... requital, our mind is thereby elevated and strengthened. The constant reference to a petty and puny race must cripple the boldness of the poet. Fortunately for his art, Shakspeare lived in an age extremely susceptible of noble and tender impressions, but which had yet inherited enough of the firmness of a vigorous olden time, not to shrink with dismay from every strong and forcible painting. We have lived to see tragedies of which the catastrophe consists in the swoon of an enamoured princess: if Shakspeare falls occasionally into the opposite extreme, it is a noble error, originating ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... laws be faithfully executed. In the discharge of this duty, solemnly imposed upon me by the Constitution and by my oath of office, I shall shrink from no responsibility, and shall endeavor to meet events as they may arise with firmness, as well as with ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume - V, Part 1; Presidents Taylor and Fillmore • James D. Richardson
... dinner mother an' Violetta had put in a bundle for me; but he said no, he wasn't hungry. An' that night I slept at a farmhouse, an' they wouldn't take any pay. An' the next day and the next I walked to Lynchburg, an' there I took the train." Her voice gathered firmness. "I had never seen one before, but I took it all right. I asked if it was goin' to Richmond, an' I climbed on. An' a man came along an' asked me for my ticket, an' I said that I didn't have one, but that I wanted to pay if it wasn't more than a dollar. An' he asked me ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... not roads made by hand it would not be possible to travel on foot, still less on horseback, and for the roads there are many houses full of materials for repairing the pavement, and in this matter the lords had so much firmness that there was nothing to do but keep it in order.[100] All the mountain fields[101] are made in the guise of stairways of stone, and the rest of the road has no great width because of some mountains that hem it in on both sides, and on one side they had made a buttress of ...
— An Account of the Conquest of Peru • Pedro Sancho
... and rent beneath his footsteps; and although, by an effort rather mechanical than voluntary, he had withdrawn himself from the instant ruin attending its descent, he felt as if the better part of him, his firmness of mind and strength of body, had been rent away with the descending rock, as it fell thundering, with clouds of dust and smoke, into the torrents and whirlpools of the vexed gulf beneath. In fact, the seaman swept from the deck of a wrecked ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 371, May 23, 1829 • Various
... headed by the turbulent General Jose T. Monagas, which was soon suppressed, the administration of Paez was such as surprised all lookers-on in America and Europe. He displayed administrative talents of a high order, with all the firmness and resolution of a soldier, yet with all the business capacity and peaceful ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... distinguished himself in the Mexican War; retired from the army in 1853, and became a professor in Mathematics and Military Science in Virginia; was appointed brigadier-general in the Confederate army at the outbreak of the Civil War, and earned the nom de guerre of "Stonewall" by his firmness at the battle of Bull Run, July 21, 1861; distinguished himself in subsequent engagements; at Chancellorville was by mistake fired at in the dark and mortally wounded by his own men on May 6, 1863; he was a man of the Cromwell stamp, and his death was not only a blow to his own party, but ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... Gibraltar of firmness. "Got date with lovely blue-eyed girlie—couldn't dish'point her. Unmanly deed—Recky, d' you want bes' fren' ev' had to do unmanly deed, and dish'point trustin' female? Nev', Recky—nev', ol' man. Lesh be true ...
— A Good Samaritan • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... consolation is not sufficient for the present, to call up and guarantee the hope of a happier future. Imagine such a man with pure human sentiments, strong enough not to deviate from them under any circumstances, and by this already elevated above the multitude of whom one cannot expect purity and firmness; give him the learning necessary for his office, as well as a cheerful, equable activity, which is even passionate, as it neglects no moment to do good—and you will have him well endowed. But at the same time add the necessary limitation, ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... with the three hostile powers at once. It would have been a great fight, for no Japanese commander would have dreamed of yielding, no Japanese ship would have struck her colors. The army was equally desirous of war. It needed all the firmness of the government to hold the nation back. Free speech was gagged; the press was severely silenced; and by the return to China of the Liao-Tung peninsula, in exchange for a compensatory increase of the war indemnity previously exacted, peace was secured. The government really acted ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn
... nurse showed any firmness, the mother would chide her sharply, and say,—"Let him have it, Mary. Let ...
— Our Young Folks at Home and Abroad • Various
... counsel with evident reluctance brought out these horrid points, a shudder ran through the court. The prisoner had borne it all with tolerable firmness up to now, but she was completely overcome by this part of the speech, and cowered down into her chair, again concealing her emotions by putting ...
— The Queen Against Owen • Allen Upward
... secure Mrs. Grant a pension; merited as he observes, by her as an authoress, 'but much more,' in his opinion, 'by the firmness and elasticity of mind with which she had borne a great succession of domestic calamities.' 'Unhappily,' he adds, 'there was only about L100 open on the Pension List, and this the minister assigned in equal portions to Mrs. G—— and a distressed lady, grand-daughter ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... of your back with the head of your club in the upward swing, it is not so much a sign that you are swinging too far back as that your wrists are enjoying too much play, that you are not holding your club with sufficient firmness, and that your arms are thrown too much upwards. Try a tighter grip. Remember that the grip with both hands should be firm. That with the right hand should not be slack, as one is so ...
— The Complete Golfer [1905] • Harry Vardon
... friction persists in spite of his brain, be so clearly impressed by the advisability of separation as the sole cure that he will steel himself to the effort necessary for a separation. One of the chief advantages of an efficient brain is that an efficient brain is capable of acting with firmness and resolution, partly, of course, because it has been toned up, but more because its operations are not confused by ...
— The Human Machine • E. Arnold Bennett
... ruddy poverty of the country and that which even a small city presents in its shabbiest streets. I remember launching at my father the pertinent inquiry why people lived in such horrid little houses so close together, and that after receiving his explanation I declared with much firmness when I grew up I should, of course, have a large house, but it would not be built among the other large houses, but right in the midst of horrid little ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... the words increased the firmness of his decision, and at the same time cheered him. His apprehensions fell away, and a glamorous excitement took their place, as he turned a corner and the music burst more loudly upon his tingling ear. For there, ...
— Seventeen - A Tale Of Youth And Summer Time And The Baxter Family Especially William • Booth Tarkington
... repent that,' she returned gently, though with firmness. 'But I think that you ought not to have got that licence without asking me first; and I also think that you ought to have known how it would be if you lived on here in your present position, and made no effort to better it. I can bear whatever comes, for social ruin is not personal ruin or ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... it is a hope. You see, when we're beaten and those of us who are left alive, surrender, the English will be sure to do the right thing ... from our point of view! That's one of the things we count on. They'll put us down with great firmness. They'll make an example of us. They'll shoot us, Henry ... and when they do that, we'll win. We're not popular now ... oh, I don't need you to tell me that ... but we'll be popular then. The ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... He spoke with firmness and authority—matters seemed hopelessly at a deadlock. There was a moment of tense silence. Kyllikki bowed her head, then slowly she looked up and faced her father, steadily, confidently—Olof noticed with surprise how the two in that moment were alike. ...
— The Song Of The Blood-Red Flower • Johannes Linnankoski
... some argument the other agreed. The decision they came to would bring Charnock's farming to an end, but Keller left the office with some doubts. His scheme was going to succeed, but he wondered whether he had indulged Sadie too far. Much depended on her firmness, and she might find the job harder than she thought; but on the whole he imagined she would ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... persons quite firm to their purpose, and these were the bride and bridegroom. With him firmness was comparatively easy. When his father suggested that the whole Bolton family was making itself disagreeable, he could with much satisfaction reply that he did not intend to marry the whole Bolton ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... for another lover. Mimi began to laugh and to utter bravados. In the end, seeing that Rodolphe was firm in his resolve, and greeted her with extreme calmness when she returned home after a day and a night spent out of the house, she began to grow a little uneasy in face of this firmness, to which she was not accustomed. She was then charming for two or three days. But her lover did not go back on what he had said, and contented himself with asking ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... be approved by the father. Thou knowest, holy Mary, that it was through no ignoble motive, but only for thy glory I did this thing, whereof, alas! my poor woman's heart more than half repented. Oh! pity, that one endowed with so many gracious qualities as Sir Christopher, should lack the iron firmness which gives consistency and dignity to life, and that his weakness compelled me to that which I would not, for the world, his noble nature should suspect: But since this letter from the father, no doubt assails ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... preserve the king from the humiliation of dismissing him, causes us to feel our yoke painfully. I promised to write to you about the king. He deserves our sympathy at this moment; his courage and firmness have not been shaken by our last disasters; he was ready to make any sacrifice, because he thought it better to fall nobly than to live dishonorably. He clung with sincere attachment to your friend Hardenberg, and just at this moment when all are deserting ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... worse still. She put on a gray gown which had never been becoming. It was not properly fitted. It was short-waisted, and gave her figure a short, chunky appearance. This chunky aspect, with her sharp face and strained back hair, made her seem fairly hideous to herself. But she remained firm. Her firmness, in reality, was one cause of the tightening and thinning of her lips. She hesitated when about to go down-stairs. She had not heard Evelyn go down. She wondered whether she had better wait until ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... age of Louis XIV were the climax of a set of ideas that instantly afterward lost alike their grace, their usefulness, and the firmness of their hold on the intelligence of men. A dignified and venerable hierarchy, an august and powerful monarch, a court of gay and luxurious nobles, all lost their grace because the eyes of men were suddenly caught and appalled by the awful phantom, which ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... of the parricide. It is surprising, therefore—and one must bow down before the judgment of God when He leaves mankind to himself—that a mind evidently of some grandeur, professing fearlessness in the most untoward and unexpected events, an immovable firmness and a resolution to await and to endure death if so it must be, should yet be so criminal as she was proved to be by the parricide to which she confessed before her judges. She had nothing in her face that would indicate such evil. She had very ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... follows: "I have fought against you to the utmost of my means and power, and am now ready, if you will, to fight under the orders of my conqueror." The courage this man had shown in battle, and his firmness in adversity, had engaged the respect of the Osmanlis, and he is as graciously received by the Pasha, who created him a Bimbashi, and received him, his companions, and followers, into his service. Malek Shouus is a large stout man, of ...
— A Narrative of the Expedition to Dongola and Sennaar • George Bethune English
... course he would forgive her. Forgiveness made him glow. But as he spoke his voice depressed him. What should he do? Could he help her? What was life, anyway? Snow outside and rows of lighted windows drifting. Her body close, warm, and saddening. The firmness of his nerves dissolved. He had his sorrow too ... Rachel. Far away. Drifting like the snow outside. Rachel ... the odor of hair brought her back. Should he cry? Her knees had touched him once like this. ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... some Kaffirs in Cape Town, sent in as witnesses, but did not see them. The following is Barrow's description of this people: "They are tall, robust, and muscular, and distinguished by a peculiar firmness of carriage. Some of them were six feet ten inches, and so elegantly proportioned that they would not have disgraced the pedestal of the Farnese Hercules." Further on, he states: "The natives of Kaffraria, if taken collectively, are ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay
... and hadn't it been distinctly on the ground of his fatigue that his wonderful friend at home had so felt for him and so contrived? It seemed to him somehow at these instants that, could he only maintain with sufficient firmness his grasp of that truth, it might become in a manner his compass and his helm. What he wanted most was some idea that would simplify, and nothing would do this so much as the fact that he was done for and finished. If it had been in such a light ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... she. It was not, however, until after having, with no little reluctance and recoil, ministered to them upon an occasion in which both were disabled for some hours, that she began to feel they had a hold upon something unseen, the firmness of which hold made it hard to believe it closed upon an unreality. If there was nothing there, then these dwarfs, in the exercise of their foolish, diseased, distorted fancies, came nearer to the act of creation ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... their attempts; but if you have more firmness than they have obstinacy, they are discouraged, and do not repeat the attempt. Thus we spare them some tears, and accustom them to cry only when pain forces them ...
— Emile - or, Concerning Education; Extracts • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... was celebrated much in the same manner as in 1769, with the addition of a short address, pronounced "with modest and decent firmness, by a member of the club, Edward Winslow, Jr., Esq.," being the first address ever ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... and confidence. Upon his return home in 1798, he was given a public reception in New York by the citizens, and a public dinner by the two Houses of Congress, "as an evidence of affection for his person, and of their grateful approbation of the patriotic firmness with which he had sustained the dignity of his country during his important mission." He subsequently took a prominent part in support of the measures of retaliation directed against France by the ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... the doctor, speaking slowly, but with firmness, "you may judge, Miss Dennis, what I think,—what any honorable person thinks,—of a man who bestows in public the sort of attentions which we saw this afternoon, You would have been insulted by ...
— Ester Ried Yet Speaking • Isabella Alden
... point of fact, authorities upon the subject refer only to the lack of growth and development in size of the larynx during the period; but undoubtedly, during these years, there is a constant gaining of firmness and strength, in both the cartilages and their connecting membranes and muscles. None of the books written upon the voice have even mentioned this most important fact. It bears with great significance upon questions relating to the capacities of the child's voice at different ...
— The Child-Voice in Singing • Francis E. Howard
... by his firmness. "Don't strike him again," he said. "Now, go out at once, or I will send for your father." The fellow got up, and, after standing a moment and considering his chance of successful resistance to physical force in the person of Tom, and moral ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... but did not delay her own departure on account of her obstinate daughter. She gave Joan up for lost, but she would not stay to share her fate. She had already seen something of the quiet firmness of the girl, which her father sometimes cursed as stubbornness, and she felt that words would only be thrown away upon her. Lamenting to the last, she mounted her palfrey, and set her train of servants in motion; whilst Joan stood ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... Her fertile growth, and by disburthening grows More fruitful, which instructs us not to spare. To whom thus Eve. Adam, earth's hallowed mould, Of God inspired! small store will serve, where store, All seasons, ripe for use hangs on the stalk; Save what by frugal storing firmness gains To nourish, and superfluous moist consumes: But I will haste, and from each bough and brake, Each plant and juciest gourd, will pluck such choice To entertain our Angel-guest, as he Beholding ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... to his successor. The patience of the House was at an end, and an address to the Crown was passed, detailing the struggle and requesting 'Your Majesty to remove Sir Colin Campbell and send to Nova Scotia a governor who will not only represent the Crown, but carry out its policy with firmness ...
— The Tribune of Nova Scotia - A Chronicle of Joseph Howe • W. L. (William Lawson) Grant
... walking briskly. Caught by the gust of wind, my gentleman from the second story window ran precipitantly into the other. The robust man was not sent backward an inch. He took the shock of meeting with the firmness of an unyielding wall, so that the slender gentleman rebounded. Each man uttered a brief oath, and grasped his sword, the slender one forgetting the condition of ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... part will not be a difficult one. If we dare remove her, we will remove her beyond the reach of that man's power. If not, your task will be to prevent food or medicine, that his hand has touched, from approaching her lips. You can do it. It will only be a question of tact and firmness. We shall have one of the greatest doctors in London for our ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... self shocked with the Harshness of those Languages, which grates so much in the Ears of those that never heard them. I never perceiv'd in the Consonants any Hardness, but such as was necessary. to afford Strength, like the Bones in a human Body, which yield it Firmness and Support. So that the worst that can be said on this occasion of our Forefathers is, that they spoke at they ...
— An Apology For The Study of Northern Antiquities • Elizabeth Elstob
... Bythewood had not yet learned of Ropes's death, messengers must be on the way to him, and therefore not a moment was to be lost. He opened the bushes. Augustus crept into them: Virginia followed. But then suddenly the negro seemed to change his plans, the spirit and firmness of the girl inspiring him with a ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... Both were surprised and angered by the showing. It appeared that not only had the company neglected its obligations, but that its officers had shrewdly concealed their shortcomings from the royal notice. The great Bourbon therefore acted promptly and with firmness. In a couple of notable royal decrees he read the directors a severe lecture upon their avarice and inaction, took away all the company's powers, confiscated to the crown all the seigneuries which the directors had granted to themselves, and ordered that the colony should ...
— The Seigneurs of Old Canada: - A Chronicle of New-World Feudalism • William Bennett Munro
... silence. The interview was at its highest pitch of excitement. Micheline knew that she must put an end to it. She replied with firmness: ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet |
