"Flattering" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... stranger gazed upon her with admiring eyes, and soon began to whisper in her ear the flattering tale of love. This, of course, her parents could not approve. What! give their darling to a stranger? Never, no, never. What could they do without her? Grieved that their kindness should have been thus returned, they bade him go his way, and leave their child in peace. ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson
... his utmost to stir up enemies against Lodovico, while, with habitual duplicity, he sent flattering messages to his brother-in-law, and begged for the continuance of his friendship. That February envoys were sent from Naples to France, under pretence of buying horses and dogs for hunting, but with secret instructions to persuade Charles VIII., if possible, to break with Lodovico Sforza, ...
— Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 • Julia Mary Cartwright
... expense. The gossip of the stage he cherished and cultivated. This made him a favorite with a large circle of female acquaintances who go in for all that kind of thing. People living, as it were, on the fringe of society, who lay the flattering unction to their souls that they are living in Bohemia, and they are never so happy as when they are settled in the company of some pseudo-player discussing the drama and ventilating the small talk of ...
— A Pirate of Parts • Richard Neville
... more than a child, with clear, blue eyes that seemed too large for her body, very timid and appealing. It is true she seldom expressed an opinion, but she listened to every one with a flattering smile, and the reputations of brilliant talkers have been built on less. She had a way of passing her two arms about Rantoul's great one and clinging to him in a weak, dependent way ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson
... BIG!" was the comment on Dr. Bellany made by his old negro servant after that noted minister's death. In Puritan piety the sternest self-depreciation qualified every thought of the creature, while every allusion to the Creator was a magnificat. Lady Huntingdon's hymn has no flattering phrases for the human subject. "Worthless worm," and "vilest of them all" indicate the true Pauline or Oriental prostration of self before a superior being; but there is grandeur in the metre, the awful reverence, and the scene of judgment in the stanzas—always remembering ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... admired by his friends; so much so, that, one day, the captain of the band thought fit to compliment him, and vowed that when he (the captain) died, Cartouche should infallibly be called to the command-in-chief. This conversation, so flattering to Cartouche, was carried on between the two gentlemen, as they were walking, one night, on the quays by the side of the Seine. Cartouche, when the captain made the last remark, blushingly protested against it, and pleaded his extreme youth as a reason why his comrades could ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... July 9th George set out for Hanover, accompanied by Secretary Stanhope. He was not long absent from England, however. On November 14th he came back again. Loyalists issued prints of the monarch waited upon by angels, and accompanied by flattering verses addressed to the "Presedent of ye Loyall Mug Houses." But the devotion of the mug-houses could not make George personally popular, or diminish the {154} general dislike to his German ministers, his German mistresses, and the horde of hungry foreigners—the Hanoverian rats, ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... without a memory!' I laughed. 'Don't be an ass, man. Look at that ribbon on your new tunic! Think of all the flattering things that have been said about you, and then talk about being a poor wreck without ...
— "The Pomp of Yesterday" • Joseph Hocking
... people of rank," replied the tailor. "The illustrious ladies who honor me with their custom like not only to see but to hear what is pleasing. Unfortunately there are among them some whom the gods have graced with but few charms, and they, strangely enough, crave the most flattering speeches. But the poor always value it more than the rich when benevolence ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the times of Vespasian. Thou wilt see all these things, people marrying, bringing up children, sick, dying, warring, feasting, trafficking, cultivating the ground, flattering, obstinately arrogant, suspecting, plotting, wishing for somebody to die, grumbling about the present, loving, heaping up treasure, desiring to be consuls or kings. Well then that life of these people no longer exists at all. Again, go to the times of Trajan. All ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... Missouri. But Mr. Jefferson Davis, an intimate friend of my father-in-law, gave me a timely hint that promotion might be better in a year or two; and his bitterest personal enemy, General Scott, gave me a highly flattering indorsement which secured leave of absence for a year. Thus I retained ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... in great good humor, and nothing could have been more flattering or more gracious than Raoul de St. Renan's reception. Louis had heard that very morning of the fair Melanie's arrival in the city, and nothing could have fallen out more apropos than the intention ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... surrounded by his spies, such was the violence and presumption of his temper, that he could not restrain himself from throwing out vaunts and menaces which served to put his enemies on the track of the most important discoveries; and in the midst of vain schemes and flattering anticipations, he was surprised on the sudden by a warrant for his committal to the Tower. His principal agents were also seized, and compelled to give evidence before the council. Still the protector seemed reluctant to proceed to extremities ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... whereon the mother upbraided her sharply, that her chastity should be unstrung, and she be captivated by charming looks; and because, forgetting to judge his virtue, she cast the gaze of a wanton mind upon the flattering lures of beauty. Thus Alfhild was led to despise the young Dane; whereupon she exchanged woman's for man's attire, and, no longer the most modest of maidens, began the ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... of Mr. Blake's sarcastic resume of Mike's short-comings at the end of the previous term, there had been something not unlike a typhoon. It was on this occasion that Mr. Jackson had solemnly declared his intention of removing Mike from Wrykyn unless the critics became more flattering; and Mr. Jackson was a ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... care what you say. A false friend may hear it, and after a year or two will repeat it. Hasty speech hurts hearer and speaker. In the beginning, think on the end. You tell a man a secret, and he'll betray it for a drink of wine. Mind what you say. Avoid backbiting and flattering; refrain from malice, and bragging. A venomous tongue causes sorrow. When words are said, regret is too late. Mind what you say. Had men thought of this, many things done in England would never have been begun. To speak aright observe ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various
... his favourite. The family remarked, at first with surprise, and afterward either with a sense of injustice or of enmity, the restraint he put upon himself, and the great partiality with which he treated me. My superior quickness excited his admiration; he held me up as an example, and laid the flattering unction to his soul that he was no tyrant; on the contrary, when people had but common ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... (we must say thus much for Catherine), Though bold and bloody, was the kind of thing Whose temporary passion was quite flattering, Because each lover looked a sort of King, Made up upon an amatory pattern, A royal husband in all save the ring—[jn] Which, (being the damnedest part of matrimony,) Seemed taking out the sting to leave ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... The pale, wasting consumption, which is the Lord's instrument for removing so many thousands every year from the land of the living made hasty strides on her constitution. The hollow eye, the distressing cough, and the often too flattering flush on the cheek, ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond
... fatherly one that he has seen a thousand times in the popular reproductions of the portrait by Gilbert Stuart. Just as for generations only the good has been told of George Washington, so has this handsomest picture (doubtless a trifle flattering) always been ...
— Virginia: The Old Dominion • Frank W. Hutchins and Cortelle Hutchins
... how puzzled was by the stories I heard. The neighbourhood portrait—and ours is really a friendly neighbourhood—was by no means flattering. Old Toombs was apparently of that type of hard-shelled, grasping, self-reliant, old-fashioned farmer not unfamiliar to many country neighbourhoods. He had come of tough old American stock and he was a worker, a saver, ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker
... we should have urged them to beware of bestowing the suffrage on a class of the community disposed so boldly to own its love of the splendors of the state. Would it be sage, would it be safe, to indulge with democratic equality a sex which already had its eyes on the flattering inequality of monarchy? Perhaps at this point we should digress a little and mention Montesquieu, whose delightful Spirit of Laws we have lately been reading. We should remind the reader, who would like to think he had read him too, how Montesquieu distinguishes between the principles ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells
... hair, Silken snood, and face sae fair; Lassie wi' the yellow hair, Thinkna to deceive me. Lassie wi' the gowden hair, Flattering smile, and face sae fair, Fare ye weel! for never mair Johnnie will believe ye. Oh, no! Mary Bawn, Mary Bawn, Mary Bawn; Oh, no! Mary Bawn, ye 'll nae mair ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... taken her to wife, not one, for she bore none too good a name; and men's speech about her, as soon as they had turned their backs and gone on their journeys, was quite opposite to the gallant and flattering things they said to her face in the bar. Some people said that Willan Blaycke was drunk when he married Jeanne, that she took him unawares by means of a base plot which her father and she had had in mind a long ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... the Chesapeake, and he might have taken what civil or military post he pleased, he chose the command of a troop of cavalry. He understood at this early day, however, the art of sacrificing pleasure at the shrine of duty; and he preserved his youth pure from those flattering vices which please for the present, but which bring disgrace, disease, and death ...
— Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell • Hugh Blair Grigsby
... voice was flattering. She had seemed like clay in his hands ever since they got on the boat to come home. He leaned back in his chair, forgot his food, and, looking at her intently, began to tell his story, the theme of which he somehow felt was ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather
... Lichfield, and the late Mr. Dewes of Wellsburn in Warwickshire, to request that I would undertake the task respecting those whose subjects best pleased me. Not acquainted with each other, the coincidence of their opinion and request was flattering. They were extensively known to be Gentlemen of distinguished virtues, much classic erudition, ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward
... few that know all the tricks and cheats of these lawyers. Does not your own experience teach you how they have drawn you on from one term to another, and how you have danced the round of all the courts, still flattering you with a final issue; and, for aught I can see, your cause is not a bit clearer than it was seven years ago." "I will be hanged," says John, "if I accept of any composition from Strutt or his grandfather; I'll rather ...
— The History of John Bull • John Arbuthnot
... person, truly, to lecture about the Gospel!... I forbear reproaching Mr. Jowett with his invariable misapplications or misapprehensions of the meaning of Scripture: his false glosses, and truly preposterous specimens of exegesis[235]. I am content to take leave of him, while he is flattering himself that he has "found the pearl of great price, after sweeping the house:" (p. 414:) and under that melancholy delusion, I fear he must be left,—holding the ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon
... service with Madame Feuillot, the brodeuse, to whom you recommended us. She is not discontented with our work, and, indeed, sent a very civil message yesterday to Sister Frances on this subject; but believe it is too flattering for me to repeat in this letter. We shall do our best to give her satisfaction. She is glad to find that we can write tolerably, and that we can make out bills and keep accounts, this being particularly convenient to her at ...
— Murad the Unlucky and Other Tales • Maria Edgeworth
... almost unconsciously, for by instinct she was truthful, she embroidered fact, magnifying her office not only in respect of her ex-pupil Damaris but of Damaris' father also. She represented herself as indispensable to both parent and child, until she more than half believed that flattering fiction. She began to reckon herself an essential element in the establishment at The Hard, the pivot indeed upon which it turned. Whereupon a rather morbid craving for the Miss Minetts' society developed ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... can mystify me?" she asked ironically. "Mr. Engelman has done more than send the flowers—he has written me a too-flattering note. And I," she said, glancing carelessly at the mantelpiece, on which a letter was placed, "have written the necessary acknowledgment. It would be absurd to stand on ceremony with the harmless old gentleman who met us on the ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... love of grace, Lay not that flattering unction to your soul That not your trespass but my madness speaks: It will but skin and film the ulcerous place. Whiles rank corruption, mining all within, Infects unseen. 528 SHAKS.: Hamlet, Act iii., ...
— Handy Dictionary of Poetical Quotations • Various
... Chicken Little, this reception is so, ah, flattering it makes me faint with emotion. Young ladies, Dr. Morton," he placed one hand over his heart and bowed low to each, "and esteemed——" he hesitated, not seeing anyone but Jilly to include in this last salutation, "esteemed fellows," he bowed once more, including trees, bushes, and any other objects ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... thou taught This flattering hope with ruin fraught? Have goblins seized thy soul, O dame, Who thus canst speak and feel no shame? Thy mind with sin is sicklied o'er, From thy first youth ne'er seen before. A good and loving wife wast thou, But all, alas! is altered now. What terror can have seized ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... but some god is flattering me with vain hopes that I may grieve the more hereafter; no mortal man could of himself contrive to do as you have been doing, and make yourself old and young at a moment's notice, unless a god were with him. A second ago you were old and all in rags, and now you ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... the following message, "This is an offering to my lord Esau from his slave Jacob." But God took these words of Jacob in ill part, saying, "Thou profanest what is holy when thou callest Esau lord." Jacob excused himself; he was but flattering the wicked in order to ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... visionary brightness o'er his brain; the poetic inspiration of the moment fled like the passing meteor, but the feeling which excited it remained engrafted on his memory for ever. "How shall we find him out, my dear Horatio?" said my aunt, her whole countenance animated with delight at the last flattering ejaculation of her nephew-"where shall we seek him?—I'll order the carriage directly." The glow of pleasure and anticipatory gratification, which at this moment beamed in the countenance of the old lady, brought back the circling current of health ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... have been a stranger in other lands, but I have never seen the like of this. If I was an orang outang there might be some reason, but to a simple mortal, or two simple mortals, like my sister and myself, their stares seem either too flattering or the reverse." ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... very simple reason. You are good and lively; although poor yourself, you do all you can for those unfortunate Morels, in interesting rich people in their behalf; you have a face that pleases me much, and a well-turned figure, which is agreeable and flattering to me, as I shall frequently accept your arm. Here are, I think, many reasons that I ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... have seen a wretched Face of Things; the Mariners, they were singing their Salve Regina, imploring the Virgin Mother, calling her the Star of the Sea, the Queen of Heaven, the Lady of the World, the Haven of Health, and many other flattering Titles, which the sacred Scriptures ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus
... now rose and through the window re-entered his room. The snatch of the conversation which he had overheard had made him uneasy and had spoiled his happy Homeric mood. He was only too willing to put the most flattering construction upon Annunciata's solicitude for his fate in the hereafter, but he had to admit to himself, that there was something in her tone and in the frank directness of her manner which precluded such an interpretation. ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... an artist—a real artist, as you are," was the answer, flattering and vicious. The man had tried to get an introduction to fair Anna and had been refused peremptorily, as all had been refused. He planned to have revenge for it. "The man who merely plays is not so vastly better off, there in the states, than here; but to the ...
— The Old Flute-Player - A Romance of To-day • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... week three or four others of the men of the original fourteen came up to Boswell's or sent small parties. Evidently the flattering paragraphs in the two dailies had also made some impression on people eager to get away from the intense heat of a season more than ordinarily trying. They found the air stirring upon the porches and through ...
— A Court of Inquiry • Grace S. Richmond
... of oneself. There is no pleasing others without beginning by flattering ourselves a little and approving of ourselves. What would the world be if everyone was not proud of his standing, his calling, so that no person would change places with another in point of good appearance, of fancy, of good family, of ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... Purple Enchanter, was used to being visited by people who wanted to get something out of him, because, as I said before, Bobolink knows everything. But he had never come across any one who did not begin by flattering him; and he took a fancy to Martin from the moment he told him he was sunpurpled. So he smiled as well as he could,—which was not very well, for he had never done such a thing before and his jaws were extremely stiff,—and for the moment he hardly ...
— All the Way to Fairyland - Fairy Stories • Evelyn Sharp
... which they met with from these native women was flattering, if not in all respects pleasant. First, they were placed in the centre of the group and gazed at in wondering admiration. Then they were seized and kissed and hugged all round the circle. Then they were examined carefully all over, and under as well, their white skins ...
— The Norsemen in the West • R.M. Ballantyne
... who sometimes are obliged to reside with them a whole year together; and, above all, are exposed to the caresses of footmen, stage-coachmen, and drawers; all of whom employ the whole artillery of kissing, flattering, bribing, and every other weapon which is to be found in the whole ...
— Joseph Andrews Vol. 1 • Henry Fielding
... richer than Agnes herself, and they had to wait till he thought that he could reasonably afford to marry. Beside this, it was a most perilous time for a priest to think of wedlock. Things might change. Hope told that "flattering tale" which she is so fond of recapitulating to young people—often most unjustifiably. Who could tell what might happen, ...
— For the Master's Sake - A Story of the Days of Queen Mary • Emily Sarah Holt
... becoming him as one whose whole lifetime marked out the strait laid down by the great poet: "where one but goes abreast." But the hospitable host was in his gayest mood. Everything contributed to make the reception a flattering one. Fanny Trevelyan was at ease among the old friends of her deeply beloved brother. Mary Douglas was in ecstacies of delight upon thus meeting Guy Trevelyan. On several occasions she was deeply sad when referring to ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour
... of the Rebellion secured for him a flattering recognition. He served in the 2nd Regiment Louisiana Native Guard Volunteers, also the 54th Massachusetts Volunteers,—the most famous of the Union negro regiments that engaged in the struggle, receiving several wounds. ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... what is our duty, if God bring us to the like extremity, as for our offences and unthankfulness justly he may. This confession is not the fair flattering words of hypocrites, lying and bathing in their pleasures; but it is the mighty operation of the Spirit of God, who leaves not his own destitute of some comfort, in their most desperate calamities. This then is our duty, not only to confess our God in ...
— The Pulpit Of The Reformation, Nos. 1, 2 and 3. • John Welch, Bishop Latimer and John Knox
... you, is the capital of intellect; and though this is but one of a hundred things equally flattering to their country which all Frenchmen believe, yet it happens to be true. In some societies it is social rank, in others wealth and fine houses, in others, still, capacity to render service to the state, which makes old men courted and opens doors to the novice. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... wrote Pauline after I had been given up to die by my physicians. It proved to be a better 'medicine' for me than all the quackeries of the quacks. It diverted my mind from myself and, perhaps, saved my life. When published, its reception by the best journals of this country and England was so flattering and, at the same time, the criticisms of some were so just, that I have been induced to carefully revise the poem and to publish my re-touched Pauline in this volume. I hope and believe I have greatly improved it. Several ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... confessed, he turned and looked straight into the eyes of his friend—the hazel-grey eyes he had so admired, as a small boy, because of the way they darkened with anger or strong feeling. And he admired them still. "A coward—am I? It's not a flattering conclusion. But I ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... much better than they were, in money; so much better than others, in money; but wit cannot be so compared, nor character. My neighbour cannot be convinced that I am wiser than he is, but he can, that I am worth so much more; and the universality of the conviction is no less flattering than its clearness. Only a few can understand,—none measure—and few will willingly adore, superiorities in other things; but everybody can understand money, everybody can count it, ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... from the commissary informed me of the very favourable reception he had met with from the captain-general, of the subject of my liberty having been touched upon, and of his entertaining hopes of a final success. The flattering reception given to Mr. Hope had been remarked to me with surprise from several hands; but a long experience of general De Caen prevented any faith in the success of his application for my release: I feared ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... of the meeting had been telegraphed to the neighboring cities by local correspondents, and Shelby ran through the newspaper accounts in the cheerless dining room, which he thought to-day by no means comfortless. There was a flattering deference in the manner of the waitresses, and the lessening of their pert familiarity told him, more plainly perhaps than anything else, that he had become a personage. He failed to remind them that the oatmeal was burned, the rolls soggy, and the coffee reminiscent of chicory. He ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther
... Coast, in the month of September of the following year, resuming the survey at its northern extremity, under the most flattering views, and with a favourable season for the prosecution of that primary object of the voyage. Between the meridians of 125 and 129 degrees, on the parallel of 14 degrees, although a large proportion of the vegetation was for the most ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... fifteen miles from Lexington, a halt was called, and another deafening cheer arose in the extreme rear and came forward like a rushing wind, as a coal-black horse galloped the length of the column—its rider, hat in hand, bowing with a proud smile to the flattering storm—for the idolatry of the man and his men was mutual—with the erect grace of an Indian, the air of a courtier, and the bearing of a soldier in every line of the six feet and more of his tireless frame. No man who ever saw John Morgan on horseback but had the picture stamped forever on his ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... this foolish matter where it lies, I have to request your Lordship's acceptance of my best thanks for the flattering communication which you took the trouble to make Mr. Murray on my behalf, and which could not fail to give me the gratification which I am sure you intended. I dare say our worthy bibliopolist overcoloured his report of your Lordship's conversation with ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... as the word the vain illusion fled, Descends, and hovers o'er Atrides' head; Clothed in the figure of the Pylian sage, Renown'd for wisdom, and revered for age: Around his temples spreads his golden wing, And thus the flattering dream ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... await his daughter's consent to a marriage which she detested, while he whipped her, or watched her being whipped, reflecting upon the luxury of the bed-post in comparison with the agony of the rack, flattering himself that he was acting in obedience to Holy Scripture, and piously meditating upon the gratification he must be giving to the soul of Solomon by this exercise of domestic discipline. But a reader may well wonder whether the ...
— The Curious Case of Lady Purbeck - A Scandal of the XVIIth Century • Thomas Longueville
... beautifully placed, and with a curious old church full of interest. Upon one of the walls is an old fresco illustrating the life and adventures of St. Christopher, and there is a quaint memorial brass erected by Barnabas Leigh in honor of his two deceased wives, and with a flattering allusion to wife No. 3, then living! One wife is followed by a troop of children—the other is forlornly alone. There is also a memorial to Sir John Leigh and his grandson Barnabas, who died seven days after ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... the hardship and dangers of the shipwreck and the loss of his merchandize by so flattering and distinguished a reception, and by the society of a woman and Queen of so much beauty, wandered with her alone through the most retired ...
— Tales of the Caliph • H. N. Crellin
... Tavern" ballads in which her heart formerly delighted; and when he had brought her to a certain point of skill, the honest little chorus-master said she should have a still better instructor, and wrote a note to Captain Walker (enclosing his own little account), speaking in terms of the most flattering encomium of his lady's progress, and recommending that she should take lessons of the celebrated Baroski. Captain Walker dismissed Podmore then, and engaged Signor Baroski, at a vast expense; as he did not fail to tell ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray
... He next endeavored, by methods verging on the unscrupulous, to create distrust of the Italian Government among the Italian people. A member of the Reichstag circulated stealthily among the deputies and journalists, flattering each in turn with the assumption that he alone was the man of the moment, and offering him, in the names of Germany and Austria, new concessions which had not been communicated to the Italian Cabinet. It was back-stairs diplomacy in its shadiest and most questionable ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... Words are easy, like the wind; Faithful friends are hard to find. Every man will be thy friend Whilst thou hast wherewith to spend: But, if store of crowns be scant, No man will supply thy want. If that one be prodigal, Bountiful they will him call; And with such-like flattering, 'Pity but he were a king.' If he be addict to vice, Quickly him they will entice; But if Fortune once do frown, Then farewell his great renown: They that fawn'd on him before Use his company no more. He that is thy friend indeed, He will help thee in thy need; If thou sorrow, he will weep, If ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... not less delicate; and the flattering prospect of its being merely hypothetical forbids an overcurious discussion of it. It is one of those cases which must be left to provide for itself. In general, it may be observed, that although no political relation can subsist between ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison
... to my intention or proportion, I will conclude this part with the note of one deficiency more, which seemeth to me of GREATEST consequence, which is, that the prescripts in use are too COMPENDIOUS TO ATTAIN THEIR END; for, to my understanding, it is a vain and flattering opinion to think any medicine can be so sovereign, or so happy, as that the receipt or use of it can work any great effect upon the body of man: it were a strange speech, which spoken, or spoken ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... it such a reputation that orders could not be filled, this season, as fast as required; is now largely used by the best wholesale and retail confectioners of Canada. With our repeat orders we have some very flattering testimonials as to its high quality. Our Prices are Right. The goods when once ...
— The Candy Maker's Guide - A Collection of Choice Recipes for Sugar Boiling • Fletcher Manufacturing Company
... containing some poetical effusions, called "Troubadours," which he found so interesting that he translated them into English, and they were introduced into his "Paul's Letters;" on the publication of which he did her the honour of sending her a copy, with a most flattering letter, to say, "that he considered her gift as the most valuable of all his ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 385, Saturday, August 15, 1829. • Various
... The press everywhere gave flattering notices. A new singer had come; not one whose life had been spent in the study of Greek roots, simply, but one who had studied nature and humanity. She had a message to give the world, and she gave it well. It was a message of good cheer, of earnest ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton
... in his throat, however, when Mrs. Anderson and her daughters opened their full course of praise on their dear Harvey and dearest Edward, telling all the flattering things Dr. Hoxton had said of the order into which Harvey had brought the school, and insisting on Dr. May's reading the copy of the testimonial that he had carried to Oxford. "I knew you would be kind enough to rejoice," said Mrs. Anderson, ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... very flattering statement, so far as the young lady was concerned, the Landgrave answered stoutly and characteristically. The Prince was a Spanish subject, he said, and would not be able to protect Anna in her belief, who would sooner or later become a fugitive: he was but a Count in Germany, and no fitting ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... as Morgan had advised. Sir John was received as the friend of the family, Lord Tanlay as a suitor whose attentions were most flattering. Amelie made no opposition to the wishes of her mother and brother, and to the commands of the First Consul, further than to dwell on the state of her health and to ask for delay on that account. Sir John bowed and submitted; he had obtained more than he had ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... felt sure that his old acquaintance and highly-valued good friend the Marchese was aware how great his (the Cardinal's) pleasure had been in discharging the duty that had devolved upon him. The letter he had that morning received from the Cardinal Secretary was a most flattering one. Perhaps he (the Cardinal) might take some credit to himself for having performed a friend's part, as was natural, in keeping them at Rome well acquainted with the singular merits of the Marchese. He would, ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... of flattering titles to men between whom and me there was not any relation to which such titles could be pretended to belong. This was an evil I had been much addicted to, and was accounted a ready artist in; therefore this evil also was I required to put away and cease from. So ...
— The History of Thomas Ellwood Written by Himself • Thomas Ellwood
... remarkable for their manners and address, and affected a superiority in acuteness, but not always in humour. Wycherley speaks of wits not exactly in the sense of humorists, but rather as coxcombs, endued with a certain cunning: "Your court wit is a fashionable, insinuating, flattering, cringing, grimacing fellow, and has wit enough to solicit a suit of love; and if he fail he has malice enough to ruin the woman with a dull lampoon; but he rails still at the man that is absent, for all wits rail; and his wit properly lies in combing perukes, ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... excited by a far more innocent and brilliant prospect. It was in the beginning of the seventeenth century, that an unbounded spirit of enterprise appears to have been excited amongst the British merchants, by vague reports of an Africa El Dorado. The most flattering reports had reached Europe, of the magnitude of the gold trade carried on at Timbuctoo, and along the course of the Niger; despatches were even received from Morocco, representing its treasures, as surpassing those ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... laid for prisoners, and that famous dungeon chamber so much spoken of, which none who had entered ever left alive. Gaston felt himself alone and abandoned. He also felt that the crime he had meditated deserved death; did not all these flattering and strange advances conceal some snare? In fact, the Bastille had done its ordinary work; the prison acted on the prisoner, who became cold, suspicious, ...
— The Regent's Daughter • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... Co. not being yet quite ready. "Get ready!" Sigwald directed them, and they diligently did. Olaf's men their business now done, were impatient to be home, and grudged every day of loitering there; but, till Sigwald pleased, such his power of flattering and cajoling Tryggveson, they ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various
... declared—"felt her insides turn right over," when she saw the carriage draw up. The conversation was prolonged and low toned. For the order was of a peculiar and confidential character, demanding much explanation on the one part, much application on the other. It was an order, in short, wholly flattering to the self-esteem of the saddler, both as tribute to his social discretion and his technical skill. Thus did ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... parting shot Captain Blyth again raised his cap politely, and stepped down out of the rigging on to a hen-coop, and from thence to the poop; and so the little verbal sparring match between the rival skippers ended, each flattering himself that he had had the best of it, and that he had come out well in the eyes of the little audience before which ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... a short time the party began to be a noisy one. Healths were drunk, toasts proposed, compliments to our respective nationalities paid in the most flattering terms. The Anglo-Saxon race were destined to conquer the globe. The English were the greatest nation under the sun - that is to say, they had been. America, of course, would take the lead in time to come. We disputed ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... since he was defeated for the legislature, and, having received so flattering a vote on that occasion, it was entirely natural that he should determine to try a second chance. Four new representatives were to be chosen at the August election of 1834, and near the end of April Lincoln published his announcement that he would again be a candidate. He ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... not at all drunk; he was merely sententious and sentimental. Sally darted a roguish eye, first round her, and then at Gaga, enjoying very specially this stage of the meal. It was all fun to her, all flattering to her vanity, all a part of the noise and excitement and well-being that was making her spirits mount. She allowed her hand to remain under his for a moment; then tried to draw it away; then pinched his thumb gently and recovered her liberty. ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... made to his doing writing for his uncle William. "I still continue," he says in a letter of October, 1820, to his mother at Raymond, "to write for Uncle William, and find my salary quite convenient for many purposes." This, to be sure, was a first approach to self-support, and flattering to his sense of proper dignity. But Hawthorne, in character as in genius, had a passion for maturity. An outpouring of his thoughts on this and other matters, directed to his sister, accompanies the letter just cited. Let us read ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... flattering opinions earned by the newcomer to the town; and these opinions he retained until the time when a certain speciality of his, a certain scheme of his (the reader will learn presently what it was), plunged the majority of the townsfolk into ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... the legend he was about to tell was interesting, he would not stop to inquire whether or not it was true. Taking upon trust the traditions which had been handed down from generation to generation, the more flattering and popular they were, the more suitable would he deem them for his purposes. He loved his country, and he would scarcely believe anything derogatory to the national glory. Whenever Rome was false to treaties, ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... in an azure field, showing a lance with a handkerchief at its point. Round its border were to be depicted the eleven alcaides defeated in the battle. This heroic deed was followed by so many others during the wars with the Moors that Perez del Pulgar became in time known by the flattering appellation of ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... feel the want of affection, or be wholly torpid to its pleasurable influences. I cannot bear to think of your going abroad with a mere travelling companion; with one at all influenced by salary, or personal conveniences. You will not suspect me of flattering you, but indeed dear Wedgwood, you are too good and too valuable a man to deserve to receive attendance from a hireling, even for a month together, ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... a new being. The burden which had weighed so long upon my spirits was removed. The root of bitterness, which continually sent up its noxious vegetation in the midst of the most flattering hopes of my public existence, was now extirpated; I was secure in the full confidence of one of the loveliest and the noblest-hearted of human beings. And yet how narrowly had I escaped the loss of all? Clotilde, hopeless ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various
... shrug with their absolute irrelevance to the only praise that could thrill her and the only purpose she held dear. Even now, when the printed lines contained the significance of a possible resource, she did not give so much as a thought to the flattering opinion of Sparta as her mother had conveyed it to her. She read them over and over, relying desperately on her own critical sense and her knowledge of what the Paris correspondent of the Daily Dial thought of her ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... Gypsies, in common with uncivilized people, entertain unbounded love for their children. This is a source of inexcusable neglect: Gypsey children never feel the rod, they fly into the most violent passions, and at the same time hear nothing from their parents but flattering and coaxing. In return they act with ingratitude, as is commonly ...
— A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland
... than justice," returned the pleased listener of this flattering and seemingly involuntary opinion—"we are indeed—indeed we are truly grateful; but had we not reason for the sacred obligations of gratitude, I think we could still be just. Will you not now consent that my people should ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... large, firm woman who wore her white hair in a marcelled pompadour, and frequently managed to have a flattering picture of herself in the Sunday papers—on the Society-and-Club-Doings page, of course. She figured prominently in civic betterment movements, and was loud in her denunciation of Sunday dances and ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... of the district is opened up so by those desperate railways that we positively dined at the Cross-Pipes Hotel the very day after we left Euston Square. Our landlady did not remember me, which was anything but flattering. But she jumped at Bob as if she would have kissed him; for he was the image of his father, whose handsome face ...
— George Bowring - A Tale Of Cader Idris - From "Slain By The Doones" By R. D. Blackmore • R. D. Blackmore
... Callonby, and Miss O'Dowd having dismounted, and shook her plumage, a little crumpled by her half-recumbent position for eight miles, appeared in the drawing-room, to receive the most courteous attentions from Lady Callonby, and from his lordship the most flattering speeches for her kindness in risking herself and bringing her horses on such a dreadful road, and assured her of his getting a presentment the very next assizes to repair it; "For we intend, Miss O'Dowd," said he, "to be most troublesome ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 1 • Charles James Lever
... library floor, virtuously engaged with building blocks. I am separating him from the other kindergarten children, and trying the Montessori method of a private rug and no nervous distraction. I was flattering myself that it was working well; his vocabulary of late ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... Conway had a very much pleasanter time than he had anticipated. Except at meals he saw little of the Miss Penfolds. His opinion as to these ladies, expressed confidentially to Mabel Withers, was the reverse of flattering. ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... to the house, they found the new visiter quietly installed in the parlor, and waiting their, or rather her, return. In high glee with the flattering prospect before him, he completely monopolized Mary's attention, and eventually put to flight the overpowered and mortified Kelson, who left the house with a heavy heart. For at least a week Mr. Millinet kept the field; he was Mary's constant companion, whether sitting ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... though he may be no nearer your hearts than before, I believe you will take more comfort in your son than you have ever done. I trust that in about two weeks we shall be able to start, and perhaps in less time than that. Please remember that my photograph is flattering; unfortunately all photographs of me are; I can get no other. At the same time Louis thinks me, and to him I believe I am, the most beautiful creature in the world. It is because he loves me that he thinks that, so I am very glad. I do so earnestly hope that you will ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... of us are devils, no doubt," said Chauvelin drily; "but why should you honour us in this case with so flattering an epithet? We are mere men striving to guard our property and mean no harm to the citizens of Boulogne. We have threatened them, true! but is it not for you and that elusive Pimpernel to see that the threat ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... Poland, he hated her oppressors. There is no doubt he idealized his country and her wrongs until the theme grew out of all proportion. Politically the Poles and Celts rub shoulders. Niecks points out that if Chopin was "a flattering idealist as a national poet, as a personal poet he was an uncompromising realist." So in the polonaises we find two distinct groups: in one the objective, martial side predominates, in the other is Chopin the moody, mournful and morose. But in all the Polish element pervades. Barring the ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... long gloves which her friend had lent her. "There was not much more that was genuine about her character—that was her very own, I mean—than there is about my appearance at this moment. She was always the dearest little chameleon in the world, taking everybody's colour in the most flattering way, and giving back, I must say, a most charming reflection—if you'll excuse the mixed metaphor; but when one got her by herself, with no reflections to catch, one found she hadn't any particular colour of her own. One of the girls used to say she ought to ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... man fares by everything opposed: * On him to shut the door Earth ne'er shall fail: Thou seest men abhor him sans a sin, * And foes he finds tho none the cause can tell: The very dogs, when sighting wealthy man, * Fawn at his feet and wag the flattering tail; Yet, an some day a pauper loon they sight, * All at him bark ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton
... her vast wealth, her excited and protected industry, is enabled to bear a burden of taxation, which, when compared to that of other nations, appears enormous; but which, when her immense riches are compared to theirs, is light and trivial. The gentleman from South Carolina has drawn a lively and flattering picture of our coasts, bays, rivers, and harbors; and he argues that these proclaimed the design of Providence that we should be a commercial people. I agree with him. We differ only as to the means. He would cherish the foreign, and neglect the internal, ...
— American Eloquence, Volume IV. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various
... and walk, "'If,' says LOGIC — 'if enjoyment is your motto, you may make the most of an evening at Vauxhall, more than at any other place in the metropolis. It is all free and easy. Stay as long as you like, and depart when you think proper.' — 'Your description is so flattering,' replied JERRY, 'that I do not care how soon the time arrives for us to start.' LOGIC proposed a 'bit of a stroll' in order to get rid of an hour or two, which was immediately accepted by Tom and Jerry. A turn or two in Bond Street, a stroll through Piccadilly, ...
— Some Roundabout Papers • W. M. Thackeray
... of a type of peasantry he had seen in old tapestries, old pictures, old sculptures, and which, up to this time, had seemed to him imaginary. He resolved for the future not to utterly condemn the school of ugliness, perceiving a possibility that in man beauty may be but the flattering exception, a chimera in which ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... English fashion. He had been aware, during these social excursions, that he was a good deal stared at and even commented on. At first he supposed this arose from some peculiarity of his dress or manner. Then he understood that the cause of this unsolicited attention bore a more flattering character, and in this connection certain remarks made by the Lady of the Windswept Dust occurred to his mind. But, Mr. Iglesias' pride being greatly in excess of his vanity—when the first moment of half-humorous surprise was passed— he found that these tributes to his personal appearance ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... obey any command he may give or to anticipate his personal wants. He is a stoutly built, rather ponderous sort of individual, with a full, rotund face and a heavy, unintellectual, but good-natured expression; one's first impression of him is apt to be less flattering to his head than to his heart. He is a person, however, that improves with acquaintance, and is probably more intelligent than he looks. He seems to be living here in a very plain and unpretentious manner; no gaudy stained ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... O'Mara hasn't time to be flattering, Bobs," she commented. "But you will have time to come Friday, for a little while, won't you?" ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... flattering declarations Rude and ignorant am I, So my arms will give reply; Which gets rid of explanations. Let their silent interfacing Figure what my ...
— The Purgatory of St. Patrick • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... delight Sleep in the shadowy couch enjoys, Late in the afternoon to rise, When the same life before him lies Till morn—life uniform but gay, To-morrow just like yesterday. But was our friend Eugene content, Free, in the blossom of his spring, Amidst successes flattering And pleasure's daily blandishment, Or vainly 'mid luxurious fare Was he in health and void ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... had already acquired for himself the reputation of being one who ceaselessly removes the gravity of others, both by word and action, and from the first he selected this obscure person for his charitable purpose to a most flattering extent. Not only did he—on the pretext that his memory was rebellious—invariably greet me as "Mr. Hong Kong," but on more than one occasion he insisted, with mirth-provoking reference to certain details of my unbecoming garments, that I must surely have become confused and sent ...
— The Mirror of Kong Ho • Ernest Bramah
... Slavery, to bring the South back in triumph, and to re-instate the Democratic party in the Presidential election of the ensuing year for a long and peaceful rule over a Union in which radicalism had been stamped out and Abolitionists placed under the ban. Such was the flattering prospect which opened to the view of the party that had so determinedly resisted and so completely defeated the Administration in the great States of the Union the preceding year. The new crusade against the President was begun ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... more sensible that in Salem air there was a cool undercurrent of feeling about him. No doubt the place was not altogether grateful for the celebrity his romance had given it, and would have valued more the uninterrupted quiet of its own flattering thoughts of itself; but when it came to hearing a young lady say she knew a girl who said she would like to poison Hawthorne, it seemed to the devout young pilgrim from the West that something more of love for the great ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... meeting Sir Christopher Columbus, a carnivorous quadruped of the family Felidae, much domesticated, in this case, white with markings as black and shiny as a crow's wing, so named because he voyaged about our village, not in search of a new world, but in search of a new home. He came to us. It is flattering to be chosen. He stayed. But who could ...
— American Cookery - November, 1921 • Various
... with Italian travelling Marquises;—finds Intendant Longchamp much in her way, with his rigorous account-books, and restriction to 100 louis per month; wishes even her Uncle were back, and cautions him, Not to believe in Friedrich's flattering unctions, or put his trust in Princes at all. Voltaire, with the due preliminaries, shows Friedrich her Letter, one of her Letters, [Now lost, as most of them are; Voltaire's Answer to it, already cited, is "24th August, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle
... monuments Piled by the strong and sunborn Anakim Over their crowned brethren [Greek: ON] and [Greek: ORE]? Thy Memnon, when his peaceful lips are kissed With earliest rays, that from his mother's eyes Flow over the Arabian bay, no more Breathes low into the charmed ears of morn Clear melody flattering the crisped Nile By columned Thebes. Old Memphis hath gone down: The Pharaohs are no more: somewhere in death They sleep with staring eyes and gilded lips, Wrapped round with spiced cerements in old grots ...
— The Suppressed Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... violent and thoughtless career of the other; and from the fate of his brother Gloucester, and the cruel and unjust treatment of the only son of his brother, John of Gaunt, he could not draw any very flattering conclusion with respect to the stability of his own family. Whether it was from suspicion of his fidelity, or from the disinclination of the chief barons to draw the sword against one who demanded nothing more than his right, the favorites of Richard became ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... her, Abarak standing by, and she helped the youth to this dish and that dish, from the serving of slaves, caressing him with flattering looks to starve aversion and nourish tender fellowship. And he was like one that slideth down a hill and can arrest his descent with a foot, yet faileth that freewill. When he had eaten and drunk with her, the Queen said, 'O youth, no other than ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... seen the paper I wrote for the 'report'? Mr. Anagnos was delighted with it. He says Helen's progress has been 'a triumphal march from the beginning,' and he has many flattering things to say about her teacher. I think he is inclined to exaggerate; at all events, his language is too glowing, and simple facts are set forth in such a manner that they bewilder one. Doubtless the work of the past few months does seem like a triumphal march to him; but then people seldom ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... pay him a royalty upon the works that should be published by them in advance of pirated editions. This offer was accepted with pleasure and gratitude, and the pecuniary result, though not very important, proved a timely help. Moreover, Roberts Brothers admired Mr. Hamerton's talent, and in very flattering terms acknowledged it, besides doing much for the spread of his reputation ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... terms, but as soon as the gazelle winded him they took to flight, and the wild cattle disappeared into the woods. When Enkidu saw the beasts forsake him his knees gave way, and he swooned from sheer shame; but when he came to himself he returned to the harlot. She spoke to him flattering words, and asked him why he wandered with the wild beasts in the desert, and then told him she wished to take him back with her to Erech, where Anu and Ishtar lived, and where the mighty Gilgamish reigned. Enkidu hearkened and finally went back with her to her city, where ...
— The Babylonian Story of the Deluge - as Told by Assyrian Tablets from Nineveh • E. A. Wallis Budge
... purpose of this work to deal with the history of the Reconstruction or rehabilitation of the Rebel States; to look too closely into the devious ways and subtle methods through and by which the Rebel leaders succeeded in flattering the vanity, and worming themselves into the confidence and control, of Andrew Johnson—by pretending to believe that his occupation of the Presidential Office had now, at last, brought him to their "aristocratic" altitude, and to a hearty recognition ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... magnificence,—the same love of standing armies, above the ability of the people. In particular, our then sovereigns, King Charles and King James, fell in love with the government of their neighbor, so flattering to the pride of kings. A similarity of sentiments brought on connections equally dangerous to the interests and liberties of their country. It were well that the infection had gone no farther than the throne. The admiration of a government flourishing and successful, unchecked in ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... defeats which had never been mine; credited me with conquests of which I knew nothing, and sat in judgment upon actions of which I had never been guilty. I scorned to contradict the slanders, and self-love led me to regard the more flattering rumors with a certain complacence. Outwardly my existence was pleasant enough, but in reality I was miserable. If it had not been for the tempest of misfortunes that very soon burst over my head, all good impulses must have perished, and evil would have triumphed in the struggle that ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... say in answer to applications so flattering and so pressing? He would have said nothing, had that been possible, but he felt himself obliged to reply. He replied very weakly,—of course, not justifying himself, but declaring that as he had gone so far he must go further. He must vote for the measure now. Both his chief and Barrington ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... express his acknowledgments for the good opinion I entertained of his abilities, and the manner in which (he had been informed) I always spoke of him; and desired that he might see me once before he died. I am aware how flattering it is to myself to be thus connected with the dying testimony which this excellent painter bore to his art. But I cannot prevail upon myself to suppress that I was not connected with him by any habits of familiarity. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. • Various
... power, its seeking is lowering enough; but when it is besought from the enlightened voter himself, "the scurvy politician" becomes a reality painfully frequent. Soliciting the ballot over a glass of green corn juice in the back room of a country grocery, or flattering the cara sposa of the farmhouse, with squalling brat upon his knee, is scarcely calculated to make the best of men more of "an ornament to society." Constant contact with sharpers and constant effort to be sharper than they is equally as apt to blunt his sense of delicacy as it is ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... flattering to a man's vanity to have a fancy like that," I say coolly, but I am conscious of a twinge; what if I do like him more ...
— Under the Southern Cross • Elizabeth Robins
... instruction, he is tempted to substitute his own hypotheses for tradition and to reconstruct the faulty outlines of forgotten history according to his own ideas of fitness. The Germans have been our masters in this species of destructive, dubitative, restorative criticism; and it is undoubtedly flattering to the historian's vanity to constitute himself a judge and arbiter in cases where tact and ingenuity may claim to sift the scattered fragment of confused narration. Yet to resist this temptation is in many cases a plain and simple duty. Tradition, ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... so watchful a guardian," said Mr. Regulus, regarding me with his old-fashioned, earnest tenderness. "We hear very flattering accounts," he added, addressing me, "of our young friend, Richard Clyde. He will return next summer, after a year's absence, having acquired as much benefit as most young men do in two ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... them directly to the great village of the Senecas, near the banks of the Genesee, flattering them with the hope that they would here find other guides, to conduct them to the Ohio; and, in truth, the Senecas had among them a prisoner of one of the western tribes, who would have answered their purpose. The chiefs met in council: but La Salle had not yet mastered the language ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... all my flattering hopes and dreams dispelled. On the 27th of January the latitude and longitude were taken, and it was then found that the Straits of Magellan were twenty-seven minutes (or nautical miles) behind us, but as we were becalmed, the captain ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... spiritual, never came to them from his hands. He could not be troubled with them much as babies, but when they grew old enough to walk and ride with him he liked their company; and they resembled him, which is always flattering. But he had taken very little notice of them during the first twelve years or so of their life. During that time they had been entirely in their mother's hands, hearing her opinions, regulated outwardly by her will: and yet they ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... Mildmay as to him; for she was a good hostess, understanding and performing her duty. But what she did say to him she said very graciously, making allusions to further intimacy between herself and Mary, flattering his vanity by little speeches as to Manor Cross, always seeming to imply that she felt hourly the misfortune of having been forced to decline the honour of such an alliance as had been offered to her. He was, in truth, as innocent ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... She said flattering things to him which meant "I find you very agreeable, Monsieur;" and she made him talk at length in order to show him, by her attention, how much he aroused her interest. He would cease to paint and sit beside her; and in that ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant
... Rhona wanted came to me. I reproduced it and enlarged it in effect. On the first night the audience applauded the screaming more than anything in the play. Madame de Rhona assured me that I had made a sensation, kissed me and said I was a genius! How sweet and pleasant her flattering words sounded in my young and inexperienced ears I need ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... adulterate wrong; And that, compared, is too satirical: For sin, though sin, would not be so esteemed; But rather virtue sin, sin virtue deemed. Her hair, far softer than the silkworm's twist, Like as a flattering glass, doth make more fair The yellow amber:—Like a flattering glass Comes in too soon; for, writing of her eyes, I'll say that like a glass they catch the sun, And thence the hot reflection doth rebound Against my breast, ...
— A Study of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... as Morgan rolled back to his seat, Silver added to me in a confidential whisper, that was very flattering, as I thought:— ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... when the ancient conception of the religious dignity of prostitution begins to fall into disrepute. When men cease to reverence women who are prostitutes in the service of a goddess they set up in their place prostitutes who are merely abject slaves, flattering themselves that they are thereby working in the cause of "progress" and "morality." On the shores of the Mediterranean this process took place more than two thousand years ago, and is associated with the name of Solon. To-day we may see the same ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... state."—Channing's Self-Culture, p. 30. "To determine these points, belongs to good sense."—Blair's Rhet., p. 321. "How far the change would contribute to his welfare, comes to be considered."—Id., Sermons. "That too much care does hurt in any of our tasks, is a doctrine so flattering to indolence, that we ought to receive it with extreme caution."—Life of Schiller, p. 148. "That there is no disputing about taste, is a saying so generally received as to have become a proverb."—Kames, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... their way along the dark road and Peter followed and heard the flattering comments and fraternal plans involving the little hero from Bridgeboro. Evidently they were going to keep Scout Harris with them and have him patented, from ...
— Pee-wee Harris on the Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... quite flattering—but your dad has my education beaten a thousand miles by his experience and shrewdness. I guess I shall have to keep to blacksmithing until I get some money ahead and until that 'something different' that you speak ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... gardener, whom I pay half-a-crown a week for combing the beds, knows nothing about them either; so my ignorance remains undiscovered. But in other people's gardens I have to make something of an effort to keep up appearances. Without flattering myself I may say that I have acquired a certain manner; I give the impression of the garden lover, or the man with shares in ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... and turned a deaf ear to their blandishments. He kept his ears open to the conversation of the Rebel officers around him, and frequently secured permission to visit the interior of the Stockade, when he would communicate to us all that he has heard. He received a flattering reception every time he cams in, and no orator ever secured a more attentive audience than would gather around him to listen to what he had to say. He was, beyond a doubt, the best known and most popular person in the prison, and ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... instances are not always to be understood new recipes but new assignations, and of the diversity between these two. That the subtilty of words, arguments, notions, yea of the senses themselves, is but rude and gross in comparison of the subtilty of things; and of the slothful and flattering opinions of those which pretend to honour the mind of man in withdrawing and abstracting it from particulars, and of the inducements and motives whereupon such opinions have been conceived ...
— Valerius Terminus: of the Interpretation of Nature • Sir Francis Bacon
... swans Bathers, who exhibited themselves in all degrees of ugliness Fred's verses were not good, but they were full of dejection Hang out the bush, but keep no tavern A familiarity which, had he known it, was not flattering His sleeplessness was not the insomnia of genius Importance in this world are as easily swept away as the sand Natural longing, that we all have, to know the worst Notion of her husband's having an opinion of his own Pride supplies some sufferers with necessary courage Seemed to enjoy themselves, ...
— Widger's Quotations from The Immortals of the French Academy • David Widger
... Your eyes are beautiful, and your hair is beautiful, and your expression is lovely. But I am not flattering you—I am not even paying you compliments, for those things are not yours; God made them, and has given ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald
... said Cissie, who had not seen Vera's alteration, and thought the portrait so flattering and talented that she saw no reason for withholding the artist's name, and, indeed, considered Patty might well be proud ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... Espana, lib. 27, cap. 11.—St. Gelais describes the cordial reception of Philip and Joanna by the Court at Blois, where he was probably present himself. The historian shows his own opinion of the effect produced on their young minds by these flattering attentions, by remarking, "Le roy leur monstra si tres grand semblant d'amour, que par noblesse et honestete de coeur il les obligeoit envers luy de leur en souvenir toute leur vie." Hist. de Louys. XII., pp. ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... that letter says. It is from the inspector. It is quite flattering to me, for he starts out with complimenting the excellent business system this ...
— Bart Stirling's Road to Success - Or; The Young Express Agent • Allen Chapman
... not seem to have roused Jaime to any great animosity against the troubadour class. Aimeric de Belenoi belauds him, Peire Cardenal is said to have enjoyed his favour, and other minor troubadours refer to him in flattering terms. ...
— The Troubadours • H.J. Chaytor
... how very soon this silly little Fly, Hearing his wily, flattering words, came slowly flitting by: With buzzing wings she hung aloft, then near and nearer drew— Thinking only of her brilliant eyes, and green and purple hue; Thinking only of her crested head—poor foolish thing! At last, Up jumped the cunning Spider, and fiercely held ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf; a Practical Plan of Character Building, Volume I (of 17) - Fun and Thought for Little Folk • Various
... highly approved of thus reciting "Our Father" in church, but he did not approve of the miracles. He suspected weakness in a man who did not know how to break resolutely with popular superstition when it was flattering to himself. ...
— The Saint • Antonio Fogazzaro
... of that year was spent in traversing that great and interesting island, on which he collected much important and valuable information. In September 1801, he set out for Quito, where he arrived in January of the succeeding year, and was received with the most flattering distinction. Having reposed for some months from their fatigues, Humboldt and Bonpland proceeded, in the first instance, to survey the country which had been devastated in 1797 by the dreadful earthquake, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... rather more than half an hour the good colt Zanzibar shivered in a cold wind while Herman warmed himself in the genial glow of flattering speeches and honeyed compliments. ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
... skilful officer, nor a painstaking magistrate. He is a man who is ignorant of nothing but who knows nothing; who, doing his own business ill, fancies himself very capable of doing that of other people; a man who has much useless wit, who has the art of saying flattering things which do not flatter, and judicious things which give no information; who can persuade nobody, though he speaks well; endowed with that sort of eloquence which can bring out trifles, and which annihilates great subjects; as penetrating in what is ridiculous and external in ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol 2 of 3) - Essay 1: Vauvenargues • John Morley
... all my follies without reservation. Surprised, amused, sometimes unable to repress a smile, sometimes genuinely compassionate, he heard my narrative through, accompanying it from time to time with muttered comments and ejaculations, none of which were very flattering to Madame de Marignan. When I had done, he sprang to his feet, laid his hand heavily ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... Eglantine that her pursuer was no other than the prince, and that far from flattering him, the portrait had ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang |
