"Fool" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fool of yourself, Sam," remonstrated he. "Reflect whom you're addressing, and in what company you are, and do try and talk like ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various
... existence. Persons much cultivating an abstract study are often thus; mathematicians proverbially so. When his servant ran to the celebrated French philosopher, shrieking, "The house is on fire, sir!" "Go and tell my wife then, fool!" said the wise man, settling back to his problems; "do I ever meddle with domestic affairs?" But what are mathematics to music—music, that not only composes operas, but plays on the barbiton? Do you know what ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... this time. I'll take you on for a try. You're sure game or you wouldn't have stood before that fool dog, the way you did. Come in and ...
— Bob Chester's Grit - From Ranch to Riches • Frank V. Webster
... exclaimed his mother, who was never quite sure when her younger son was playing the fool. "You know that Brahmas are hens. I've got some in my flock those big white and black, lazy fowls, with ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... a sot and a fool, but he did not want for pluck. His first disposition was to give battle, beginning to call out for his men to come to his assistance, but I put an end to this, by seizing him by the collar, and dropping him, a little unceremoniously, down the companion-way. Half an hour later, he was dead drunk, ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... not?' Then there was a pause. 'But I am a fool to ask such a question as that, and I should be worse than a fool were I to press it. It must then ...
— The Belton Estate • Anthony Trollope
... tack!" sourly quoth Master Silas. "If your wise doctor could say nothing more about the fool, who died like a rotten sheep among the darnels, his Latin might have held out for the father, and might have told people he was as cool as a cucumber at home, and as hot as pepper in battle. Could he not find room enough on the whinstone, ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... none of us go after her," replied John, "to bring her back; but I am a fool," added the honest man; "here have I lived ever since master came here, and most of these trees did I plant and graff with my own hands, and made the sparrow-grass beds and all, and now this woman is to come with her ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... a fool. Wouldn't I cut a pretty picture slipping around on a pair of sticks trying to catch up with the strongest ski man in the county! He'd double up on me every mile. And with the night coming on I'd stand a great chance finding ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... away from me!—that's a d—d good joke, a'n't it? Away from your husband! You fool! you can't get away from me! you're mine, soul and body,—this world and the next! Don't you know that? Where's your promise, eh?—'for better, for worse!'—and a'n't I worse, you cursed fool, you? You didn't put on the handcuffs for nothing; heaven and hell can't get ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... ye feelin' to-day? hearty? that's clever! I hope you wasn't frettin' about that pin any. Most girls would, but you ain't the fool kind." ...
— The Green Satin Gown • Laura E. Richards
... the encourager and supporter of art has been the same in all ages,—a fitful and vacillating current of vague impression, perpetually liable to change, subject to epidemic desires, and agitated by infectious passion, the slave of fashion, and the fool of fancy, but yet always distinguishing with singular clearsightedness, between that which is best and that which is worst of the particular class of food which its morbid appetite may call for; never failing to distinguish that which is produced by intellect, from that which ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... their chase. But I have been rarely drubbed and roundly basted, and my poor back and sides are most womanishly tender. I go abroad no more without Excalibur." He tapped his sword hilt as he spoke. Huguette glared fiercely up at him. "Will it teach you not to play the fool again?" asked, with a vicious snap of her ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... stateroom wearing the same disheveled look that Jonah must have worn when he and the whale parted company, do you think she would confess she had been seasick? Not by any means! She said she had had a raging headache. But she could not fool me. She had the stateroom next to mine and I had heard what I had heard. She was from near Boston and she had the near-Boston accent; and she was the only person I ever met who was seasick with ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... are in the habit of laying it down as a self-evident proposition, that no people ought to be free till they are fit to use their freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story, who resolved not to go into the water till he had learned to swim. If men are to wait for liberty till they become wise and good in slavery, they may indeed ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... "Could Sir William place her, think you, or does that half-breed swarm of his fill the house? It seemed right enough to bring her out from the Palatine country, but now that she's out, damme! I almost wish she was back again. What a fool not to leave her ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... me? Have you made smell and dirt enough? How long is this to last, I should like to know?" cried Mrs Forster, entering the room. "I tell you what, Mr Forster, you had better hang up a sign at once, and keep an ale-house. Let the sign be a Fool's Head, like your own. I wonder you are not ashamed of yourself, Mr Curate; you that ought to set an ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... dizened out To sit in state as for a Sovereign's picture; A popular scourge, a ready sentence-signer, 190 A stickler for the Senate and "the Forty," A sceptic of all measures which had not The sanction of "the Ten,"[424] a council-fawner, A tool—a fool—a puppet,—they had ne'er Fostered the wretch who stung me. What I suffer Has reached me through my pity for the people; That many know, and they who know not yet Will one day learn: meantime I do devote, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... purpose of heading off Lee; but Meade was so much impressed by this man's story that he thought we ought to cross the Appomattox there at once and move against Lee in his new position. I knew that Lee was no fool, as he would have been to have put himself and his army between two formidable streams like the James and Appomattox rivers, and between two such armies as those of the Potomac and the James. Then these streams coming together as they ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... I'm to stand here and freeze while you sit over there and laugh your fool head off!" shouted the Easterner. "I've got some dry clothing in my trunk on the wagon, which I might put on, if I could induce you to hurry ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer
... and very painful. The stranger carried my gun, and in a couple of hours we overtook my comrades. As I got on to my mule I thought what a fool I had been to go alone so far on a wild-goose chase. That day's experience ended my hunting at any considerable distance ...
— In the Early Days along the Overland Trail in Nebraska Territory, in 1852 • Gilbert L. Cole
... one that, nowadays, the learned among my countrymen answer very rabidly in the negative. You have but to propound it in a whisper, to make them foam heartily at the mouth. Bless you, they know that it didn't, and can prove it over and over; because—because—it couldn't have, and you are a fool for thinking it could. Here is the position taken by modern scholarship (as a rule): we know nothing about the philosophy of the Druids, and do not believe they had one. They could not have had one; and the classical writers who said they had simply ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... companion. Accosted by another soldier, he was asked why he was carrying a man whose head had been shot away. He stoutly denied the allegation and, at length, dropped the headless body to prove the other's hallucination. Seeing that the man's head was, in truth, gone, he exclaimed, "Why, the durn fool told ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson
... in it," said John. "I'm inclined to think it's a hoax. Some one trying to fool the old fellow. If there'd been any treasure, I guess one could have trusted old 'Wrecker' Wicks to get after it.... But, boys, it's bed-time, anyhow. Come down to the office in the morning and ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... only too happy to accept an invitation to meet them at dinner. Ask the most eloquent writer of philippics who has known, say a score of Ministers on both sides personally, and who is reasonably tolerant, modest and candid, which of them does he believe really to be either a knave or a fool; he will answer, "None, though I am not quite sure about X." We all have our ineradicable antipathies. Fortunately there is something forensic about English political contests. The astonished client sees the advocates who have been hottest in ...
— Rebuilding Britain - A Survey Of Problems Of Reconstruction After The World War • Alfred Hopkinson
... he reasoned. "No sane person could endure an hour of that fool song. No sane person would sing it for ...
— The Green Mouse • Robert W. Chambers
... what not. To which I shall reply, "In order to be certain of that, you must be a good judge both of the physical and of the mental fact. It is not enough that you should know a microcephalous skull when you see it. It is also necessary that you should know a fool when you see him; and I have a suspicion that you do not know a fool when you see him, even after the most lifelong and intimate of ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton
... nothing under the heavens to do but to march a new line of men up in front of the rebel breastworks to be shot down as fast as they take their position, and keep marching until the enemy grows tired of the slaughter. Grant, I repeat, is an obstinate fool and a butcher." ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley
... the judge didn't understand. The bloody fool would have spoiled all my fine work. He would have got a life term instead of fourteen years. He's got enough, though, poor chap. I wish to Heaven the other fellow had ...
— The Foreigner • Ralph Connor
... palace. Then the folks asked him whence he came, and what kind of man he was, and what were his father and mother's names. But Ivan only replied to their questions, "I don't know." So they all took him for a fool, and went and told the Chinese Tsar about him. Then the Tsar ordered Ivan to be called, and asked where he came from and what was his name; but he only answered as before, "I don't know." So the Tsar ...
— The Russian Garland - being Russian Falk Tales • Various
... from his grasp as that he refuses to resign a particular manor, Pope forgot that even a jest-book must govern its jokes by some regard to the realities of life, and that amongst these realities is the very nature and operation of a will. A miser is not, therefore, a fool; and he knows that no possible testamentary abdication of an estate disturbs his own absolute command over it so long as he lives, or bars his power of revoking the bequest. The moral instruction is in this case so poor, that no reader cares much upon what sort of foundation ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... little of the neighbours at first. The women looked rather askance at her, and thought her little better than a fool, even if she had contrived to make one of Jacques De Arthenay. She never seemed to understand their talk, and had a way of looking past them, as if unaware of their presence, that was disconcerting, ...
— Marie • Laura E. Richards
... ability in the house of Bourbon, for the last hundred years, than in any other family."—"You prove that?" said somebody, sneeringly. "Yes," said Duclos; "and I will tell you how. The great Conde, you will allow, was no fool; and the Duchesse de Longueville is cited as one of the wittiest women that ever lived. The Regent was a man who had few equals, in every kind of talent and acquirement. The Prince de Conti, who was elected King of Poland, was celebrated ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... partial—deathbed robbery; for as it is cruel, so is it dastardly. Yes, it went on enlisting, plundering and uttering its terrible threats till—till it became, as it always does when left to itself, a fool, a very fool. Its plunderings might have been overlooked, and so might its insolence, had it been common insolence, but it—, and then the roar of indignation which arose from outraged England against the viper, the frozen viper which it had permitted ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... inevitable; it was plain to be understood that she had loved Michael all along, and nothing he personally could have done with all his devotion could have changed this fact. He ought to have known that it was hopeless and that he was only living in a fool's paradise. Never once had he seen the light in her eyes for himself which sprang there even at the mention of Michael's name. What was this tremendous power this man possessed to so deeply affect women, to so greatly charm every one? Was it just "it," ...
— The Man and the Moment • Elinor Glyn
... all you'll have to do is give your orders to the servants.' And every time I says to Tom, 'No, Tom,' I says, 'I'm not ready yet. I've been with these children since before they was born and I can't leave 'em yet. But thank you just the same,' I says. And Tom says, 'Effie, yir a born fool! What do you think them children care for you?' he says. 'Only what they can get out of you,' he says. And," concluded Effie, her voice again choked with tears, "I am a fool and Tom's right. They don't care nuthin' for me and I'm ...
— A Little Question in Ladies' Rights • Parker Fillmore
... or mother? Such an act committed by a white man under the same circumstances would not only be pronounced proper, but praiseworthy; and if he neglected to avail himself of such a means of escape he would be pronounced a fool. Therefore from this act I have nothing to regret, for I have done nothing more than any other reasonable person would have done under the same circumstances. But I had good luck from the morning I left the horse ...
— Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an American Slave, Written by Himself • Henry Bibb
... have wan vote, too," said Bonner. "I thought mesilf the only dang fool on the board—an' he made a spache that airned wan vote—but f'r the love of hivin, that dub f'r a teacher! What come over you, Haakon—you ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick
... and a fool you are!" laughed the Su-dic, dancing madly in his delight. And then he carelessly tipped over the other copper vessel with his heel and its contents spilled on the sands and were lost to the ...
— Glinda of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... now philosophy, Jurisprudence and medicine, And e'en, alas, theology From end to end with toil and teen, And here I stand with all my lore, Poor fool, no wiser than before. No dog would live thus any more! Therefore to magic I have turned, If that through spirit-word and power Many a secret may be learned That I may find the inner force Which binds the ...
— The Faust-Legend and Goethe's 'Faust' • H. B. Cotterill
... mistaken in his judgment, and I presume he was not, viz. that it was unlawful for them to fire without the order of the civil magistrate, they were certainly from the beginning, at least very imprudent and fool-hardy, in going down, armd as they were, with weapons of death, without the direction of the civil magistrate; especially, if they intended to fire, as I think it is manifest they did.— When Captain Preston was asked, Whether the soldiers intended to fire, he answerd they could not fire ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams
... any fool from their Parliament holds a whip over the back of the Lat Sahib and all the white men in this land. This one hath no love for ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... had to sell her tea at half-price, in order to get other things which she wanted. I spoke to her about it, and said I had never heard of such a thing being done before, and that she must be a great fool to do anything of the kind; for she had come to us and said that she wanted the money, she would have got it upon giving ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... her ear, followed by exclamations of "Poor thing!" "So courageous!" "Chivalric sentiments!" Of course, everyone added that they excused her toilette. Then when she tried to escape such remarks by wearing a new gown, Dolly, who was always a little fool (there is no cure for that infirmity) cried out in a tone such as she never would have dared to use in the days when Jacqueline was a model of elegance: "Oh, how fine you are!" Then again, Madame d'Avrigny, notwithstanding the good manners on which she prided herself, could ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... and advised him not to continue a work which was only a false interpretation of the Scriptures and of everything which the holy fathers had written; and as he perceived that Calvin remained firm in his wicked purpose, he gave notice thereof to the Constable, who declared that Calvin was a fool and should soon be brought to his senses. But two days after, the benefice having been bestowed on the relative of the Constable, Calvin departed and began to propagate his sect, which, being very convenient, was embraced by many ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... prejudice, and I should be sorry if from what I have written here it does not sufficiently appear that I cherish a burning prejudice against the British Tourist in India, who comes out to get up India and to do India; not against the tourist who comes out to shoot or to play the fool in a quiet ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... not been for that accursed sledge, I would have shown you what sort of an imbecile I am. I can't get away now, and I will tell you how I would have been an idiot. I would have gone back to the pole, at least to the little house, where, like a fool, you left the end of your cable open to me, open to anybody on board who might be brave enough to take advantage of your imbecility. I had food enough with me to last until I got back to the pole, and I knew of the 'cache' ...
— The Great Stone of Sardis • Frank R. Stockton
... pulled down the ancient altars of his diocese, and ordered the Eucharist to be administered in the middle of churches, at tables which the Papists irreverently termed oyster boards. Bishop Jewel pronounced the clerical garb to be a stage dress, a fool's coat, a relique of the Amorites, and promised that he would spare no labour to extirpate such degrading absurdities. Archbishop Grindal long hesitated about accepting a mitre from dislike of what he ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... and tight boots. He quotes poetry on the weather yard-arm, to the great dissatisfaction of Mr. Brewster, (to whom you will shortly be introduced,) who often confidentially assures the skipper that the third mate would have turned out a natural fool if his parents had not providentially sent him ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... himself, for the sake of an empty title. His motives—and he was honest, when he so avowed them—were motives of state at least as much as of self-advancement. "I have no cause," he said, "to have played the fool thus far for myself; first, to have her Majesty's displeasure, which no kingdom in the world could make me willingly deserve; next, to undo myself in my later days; to consume all that should have kept me all my life in one half year. ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... been in them parts arter beaver, which war plenty, an' no mistake; an' one day, when I had gone to cache some skins, I left my rifle in the grass near my traps, like a gosh darned fool. Who should came along but a party of them black niggers, the Crows; and the first thing they sot eyes upon was my shootin' iron. In course, I seed it all, and jist had to lay low and cuss my tarnal stupidity, while them ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... ha' had a lawyer, mister!" he said. "S'elp me, I'm a blooming fool for not thinking of it! Be careful—the Coroner's ...
— The Orange-Yellow Diamond • J. S. Fletcher
... replied, after a pause. "Jim is just fool enough. He had been gettrn' recklessler lately. An', Joan, the times ain't provocatin' a young feller to be good. Jim had a bad fight the other night. He about half killed young Bradley. But ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... addressed myself to the captain. "There's an island with shipwrecked men on it a few miles to the north-east," said I. "We shall see land in about ten days, ma'am," says the captain to a lady on deck. "There's as big a fool as yourself wrecked on an island north-east by north," I cried. "If you had the skill of a sparrow you could see it with your own eyes in five minutes." "It's very remarkable," said the captain, "I never heard one ...
— Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... her side, abominable on mine; and I returned the same evening to Richmond, though I might have staid with you till the next morning, merely because I would be as angry with her as possible. Even then, I was not such a fool as not to mean to be reconciled in time; but I was the injured person, injured by her coldness, and I went away determined that she should make the first advances.—I shall always congratulate myself ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... This is a poor reflexion upon him, and indeed rather raises, than detracts from his reputation, for a man certainly must have merit, who can rise without the advantage of fortune or birth, whereas these often procure a fool preferment, and make him eminent, who might otherwise have lived and died in obscurity. It is said of Birkenhead, that when an unmannerly Member of Parliament, in opposing him, took occasion to say, that he was surprized to hear an alehouse-keeper's son ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber
... cried in a spent voice, 'I have no money, for you did take all I had when you told us our lord Geraint was become a court fool.' ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert
... the rock upon which all our dreams were wrecked. My father would but reply sourly to any question I might venture that my fair Jeanette was the ward of a friend who, on his death-bed, had bequeathed her to his clemency—the fool!" ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... breaking. The pink sky cast a glow on the city, its roofs, and its walls. A flush of light enveloped the awakened world, like a caress from the rising sun, and the glimmer of dawn kindled new hope in the breast of the vicomte. What a fool he was to let himself succumb to fear before anything was decided—before his seconds had interviewed those of Georges Lamil, before he even knew whether he would have to fight ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... remembrance, full of humiliation, but not altogether without charm. There was the beauty of sea and open sky and changing country weather; and the beauty of Mrs. Deane, who made a fool of me to revenge herself on Colonel Ibbetson for trying to make a fool of her, whereby he became the laughing-stock of the neighborhood ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... responded the smoker, opening his eye a little wider, and taking the pipe from his mouth. "Speak English, you fool," bawled Mr. Jorrocks. "Sie sind sehr unverschaemt" (you are very impudent), replied the Dutchman with a thump on the table. "I'll run you through the gizzard!" rejoined Mr. Jorrocks, half drawing his sword,—"skin you alive, in fact!" when in rushed the ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... tears; a silent, miserable, resigned sort of crying, as if she had lost all claim to be pitied, and all right to feel wounded or hurt. I was so distressed, that I thought of nothing but consoling her. I meant well, and I acted like a fool. A sensible man would have lifted her up, I suppose, and left her to herself. I lifted her up, and put my arm round her waist. She looked at me as I did it. For just a moment, I declare she became twenty years younger! She blushed as ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... I had been at such pains to build up on the island proved all too little yet; at the first thrill of the organ I was torn from my setting and came near to sobbing aloud. "Keep quiet, you fool," I said to myself, "it's only neurasthenia." I had chosen a seat well apart from the rest, and hid my emotion as best I could. I was glad when that ...
— Wanderers • Knut Hamsun
... where she pleases without exciting curiosity, and seeing and hearing what is most useful and essential for her in writing her books. She is undoubtedly the most masculine mind of France at the present day. Through the folly of her relations she was early married to a fool, but she soon left him in disgust, and afterwards formed a friendship with Jules Sandeau, a novelist and clever critic. It was he who discovered her genius, and first caused her to write. It was the name of this author, Jules Sandeau, that she altered into Georges Sand—a name which ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... on the subject of the currency may possibly find admirers even in our own time. But to his other errors he added an error which began and ended with him. He was fool enough to take it for granted, in all his reasonings, that the value of an estate varied directly as the duration. He maintained that if the annual income derived from a manor were a thousand pounds, a grant of that manor for twenty years must be worth twenty thousand pounds, and a ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... thought, that she should have seen Dick drunk, that she should have seen him knock Charley down. He wondered if there were any way he could make her forget it. Then with a deep flush in the starlight he wished to God she had not seen him lose his temper like a fool. Felicia! ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... flight be considered as his own act, or the act of those who fled with him? Was it a spontaneous resolution of his own, or was it inspired by others? The alternative is immaterial; whether fool or hypocrite, idiot or traitor, he has proved himself equally unworthy of the important functions that had been ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... nobody but a fool or some prying mudsill of a Yankee would trust his skin here," returned another; "and if he did we'd know ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte
... years ago. It has been my curse; now it's all gone—every penny! Yes, I've been a fool; there never was nor will be such a fool as I've been.... Isn't this enough for you? Why don't you turn me out?" He was walking up and down with a very long ...
— The Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... character which such impertinence will not degrade. Inexcusable, therefore, must be the practice which has neither reason nor passion to support it. The drunkard has his cups; the satirist his revenge; the ambitious man his preferments; the miser his gold; but the common swearer has nothing; he is a fool at large, sells his soul for naught, and drudges in the service of the devil gratis. Swearing is void of all plea, it is not the native offspring of the soul, nor interwoven with the texture of the body, nor any how allied to our frame. For, as Tillotson expresses it,'Though some ...
— Frost's Laws and By-Laws of American Society • Sarah Annie Frost
... you steady job for sure, an' w'en you get 'im t'roo I bring you back on Canadaw, don't cos' de man un sou, Dat's firs'-class steamboat all de way Kebeck an' Leeverpool, An' if you don't be satisfy, you mus' be beeg, beeg fool." ...
— The Habitant and Other French-Canadian Poems • William Henry Drummond
... enraged hereat, choosing Tatius their captain, marched straight against Rome. The city was almost inaccessible, having for its fortress that which is now the Capitol, where a strong guard was placed, and Tarpeius their captain; not Tarpeia the virgin, as some say who would make Romulus a fool. But Tarpeia, daughter to the captain, coveting the golden bracelets she saw them wear, betrayed the fort into the Sabines' hands, and asked, in reward of her treachery, the things they wore on their left ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... when Mr. Sutherland strode off, leaving his daughter alone with me, I remember very well that Frances abruptly began putting my pillow to rights. Instead of keeping wide awake, as I should by all the codes of romance and common sense, I—poor fool—at once swooned, with a vague, glimmering consciousness that I was dying and this, perhaps, was the first blissful glimpse into paradise. When I came to my senses, Mr. Sutherland was again standing by the bedside with a half-shamed look of ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut
... things are those? I marvel what they be! What art thou a fool? the tanner replied; I carry one ...
— The Book of Brave Old Ballads • Unknown
... delight. He did not know what had been happening. He only thought that now he was going to catch the fox, which was the stupidest fox he had ever chased, running as it did, straight away, with never a leap or a circle, or any other sort of trick to fool him. Little did Spot guess that old Mrs. Fox had not the slightest idea of being caught. She had been followed by Spot himself many times; and she knew exactly how to escape him. She just lingered for a few moments, to make sure that Tommy was safe, and that ...
— The Tale of Tommy Fox • Arthur Scott Bailey
... you tied to something?' Mr. Fox would laugh a good deal, too, and he told my ancestor to go on and finish the race—that he couldn't wait around there all day. And pretty soon he said if they were going to fool along like that, he'd just go down to the fence and take a nap till they got there; and for Grandpaw Rabbit to call to him when he really started to come, so he could wake ...
— How Mr. Rabbit Lost his Tail • Albert Bigelow Paine
... process; so determined that this shaking out of a 'preconception,' shall be for once a thorough one, so absorbed with the dignity of the scientific experiment, that he seems bent at one moment on giving a literal finish to this process; but the fool's scruples interfere with the philosophical humour of the king, and the presence of Mad Tom in his blanket, with the king's exposition, suffices to complete the demonstration. For not less lively than this, is the preaching ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... have never made a fool of myself in my life, and I am not going to begin now. Here is a friend of mine (his lawyer) who can talk all day. ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... Thornton was not a fool, and Daisy was not a fool, though I admit they have thus far appeared to disadvantage. Both had made a great mistake; Guy in marrying a child whose mind was unformed, and Daisy in marrying at all, when her whole nature ...
— Miss McDonald • Mary J. Holmes
... tinder-box, its contents catching at any spark that is flying about. I always like to hear what he says when his tinder brain has a spark fall into it. It does not follow that because he is often wrong he may not sometimes be right, for he is no fool. He treated ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... live upon the new comer as long as he can give him good fare and his horn of whisky. When these fail, farewell to your good-hearted, roystering friends; they will leave you like a swarm of musquitoes, while you fret over your festering wounds, and fly to suck the blood of some new settler, who is fool enough to ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... it works according to reason, improves the amiable part of our species; so, nothing is more destructive to them, when it is governed by vanity and folly;" "The wise man is happy, when he gains his own approbation; the fool, when he gains the applause of those around him;" "Straws swim upon the surface; but ...
— English Grammar in Familiar Lectures • Samuel Kirkham
... peculiar, abrupt, crusty way the Sage of Chelsea interrogated the young man: "For what profession are you studying?" "I don't know," returned the youth. "You don't know," thundered Carlyle, "young man, you are a fool." Then he went on to qualify his vehement remark, "My boy when I was your age, I was stooped in grinding, gripping poverty in the little village of Ecclefechan, in the wilds of [Transcriber's note: Part of word illegible]-frieshire, where in all the place only the minister and myself ...
— How to Speak and Write Correctly • Joseph Devlin
... fear For to-day or to-morrow? 'Tis the part of a fool To go seeking sorrow. Of thine own doing Thou canst not contrive them. 'Tis He that shall give them; Thou may'st not outlive them. So why cloud to-day With fear of the sorrow, That may or ...
— 'All's Well!' • John Oxenham
... apparently belonging to the Yens, but to the smaller race, he held several other offices in conjunction with this—those of cook and chamberlain, for example: his talent, however, seemed most to incline to that of court-fool or harlequin. ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue
... for the crag this very minute. Thou must quietly collect and arm a few of our stanchest men, together with the English servants left here with their young mistress. Let all be done secretly and quietly, and come after me with all speed. It may be that we are on a fool's errand, and that our fears are groundless. But truly it may be that our brothers are about to betray our guest into the hands of one of England's most ...
— The Lord of Dynevor • Evelyn Everett-Green
... the other. The individual is master of his fate, and he is the ultimate determinant of government. If government is sound, the misbehavior of the individual can ruin it; if government is defective, the assumption of responsibility by the individual must ultimately reform it. We do not need a fool-proof government half as much as we need active, responsible individuals to run the government we already have. "How long will American democracy last?" a European statesman once asked. "Just so long," the answer might have been, "as Americans honestly ...
— Problems in American Democracy • Thames Ross Williamson
... much remarked; all the daughters of the hairdresser next door have had their hopes of me—indeed, there is scarcely a neighbour who is not chagrined at the turn events have taken—and the world would be only too glad of an excuse to call me 'fool.' Pomponnet's wife must be above suspicion. You will remember that a little lightness of conduct which might be forgiven in the employee of the florist would be unseemly in my fiancee. No more conversation with monsieur Tricotrin, Lisette! ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... would say. Thank you all the same, both of you. You've both been very pleasant gentlemen and very nice ever since you have been here. You neither of you ever called me a lazy beast and shied your boots at me because they wasn't black enough, or called me a fool for not making your water hotter so ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... I think about it?" exclaimed Sam, after they had laid the state of the case before him. "I'll tell ye, boys. Big Gipples, him no fool. He's stowed his fat carcase away somewhere down in de hold. Let's you all and me go and look for him, and we soon rouse him up like one ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... that Jost is expecting to hear from him. Though he does call me stupid, I have my eye on him," said Blasi, with angry emphasis. "And I know it was Jost who advised Dietrich to run away and hide, though he didn't mean to let me know. Oh, I'm no fool!" ...
— Veronica And Other Friends - Two Stories For Children • Johanna (Heusser) Spyri
... sentry's passing to the farthest point from the spy hole, the Kentuckian rolled to the floor, slapped and pulled the blanket into place over the mounded straw. Not too good—it certainly would not fool any inspection within the room. But in the lantern light and this far from the door, the improvised dummy might satisfy the glance of the sentry ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton
... Sir Louis, "there's no objection; only a stipulation: We wouldn't let an Englishman go, because of the risk—not to him, but to us. Any fool has a right to get killed, but not to obligate his government. All the missionaries were called in from those outlying districts long ago. We don't want to be held liable for damages for failure to protect. Such things have happened. You see, the idea is, we assume no responsibility ...
— Jimgrim and Allah's Peace • Talbot Mundy
... felt that there was a mystery! Oh! what a fool he had been to shut himself up and eat his food there! Of course they would know that this mystery must have some reference to the will. Thus they would so far have traced the truth as to have learnt that ...
— Cousin Henry • Anthony Trollope
... irritation and annoyances, the revolt against her own sex feeling and her life situation, arose the neurosis. It took the form mainly of sudden unaccountable fears with faint dizzy feelings. The family physician on the aside told me that it was "just a case of a damn fool woman with everybody too ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson
... throne, "to expound the reason why this Parliament was summoned. And true it is that the wise suffer and desire to hear fools speak, as is affirmed by St. Paul in his Epistles, for he saith: Libenter suffertis insipientes cum sitis ipsi sapientes. And in as much as you are wise and I am a fool, I understand that you wish to hear me speak. And another cause there is, which will rejoice you if you are willing to hear me. For the Scripture saith that every messenger bringing glad tidings, must be always welcome; and I am ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... of nature. This lay-brother had the care of the garden of pot-herbs and fruit-trees, and as he was toiling there one day the Abbot called the uncharitable monk to him, and said: "Come, let us see what our brother the Fool is doing." ...
— A Child's Book of Saints • William Canton
... himself, a good old man, whom they loaded with plunder, and day after day continued to treat with the most shocking cruelty, painting him all over with various colours, plucking the white hairs from his beard, and telling him he was a fool for living so long, and many other tortures which he bore with wonderful composure, ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various
... will make their anger cool, At least, before 'tis night; But in the bosom of a fool It burns till ...
— Pleasing Stories for Good Children with Pictures • Anonymous
... is a lovesome thing, God wot! Rose plot, Fringed pool, Ferned grot— The veriest school Of peace; and yet the fool Contends that God is not— Not God! in gardens! when the eve is cool? Nay, but I have a sign: 'Tis very sure God walks ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... Nimrod, is accounted a thing that is over and above, and is laid by the Holy Ghost as a blot upon Cush for ever; for when men would vilify, they used to say, Thou art the son of the rebellious, the son of a murderer. So again, He that begetteth Solomon's fool, (or, wicked one) he begetteth him to ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... of beasts. Young girls will come firmly to meet lions and tigers, but not one of the madmen will fight with men. The populace are bitterly disappointed in Macer. He is the very best of all the gladiators, and in becoming a Christian he has acted like a fool." ...
— The Martyr of the Catacombs - A Tale of Ancient Rome • Anonymous
... is not such a fool as the rest of them," said Umqua, in a slightly softer tone; "but why does my son talk foolishness about going to the tents of his enemy, and giving up a girl who it is easy to see is good and wise and true, and a hard worker, and not ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... part like this! I've suffered enough to-day. You're only teasing me. And I've acted like a fool. Say that ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... themselves of the boon. All the instances of the colonel, in behalf of a charming little girl, four years old, whose mother and sister had already taken the infection, could get from her father nothing more than a promise "to think of it! If it's her fate——" said he. "'You fool!' said I, in my civil way," (and the colonel's brusquerie was here, at least, not misplaced,) "'if a man throws himself into the fire or a well, or in the path of a tiger, is he without blame?'" Such apathy seems almost unaccountable ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various
... hereditary Nobility, or any particular Modification, but "the natural, and actual Aristocracy among Mankind;" The existence of which, I am not disposed to deny. Where is this Aristocracy to be found? Among Men of all Ranks and Conditions. The Cottager may beget a wise Son; the Noble, a Fool: The one is capable of great Improvement—the other not. Education is within the Power of Men, and Societys of Men. Wise, and judicious Modes of Education, patronized, and supported by communities, will draw together the Sons of the rich, and the poor, among whom it makes no distinction; ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... completely mollified, 'I'm not the least angry. There, goodbye!' and like a fool ...
— Victorian Short Stories of Troubled Marriages • Rudyard Kipling, Ella D'Arcy, Arthur Morrison, Arthur Conan Doyle,
... caused by his conduct in the morning. By dint of lying about friendship and fatherhood, he somewhat reassured the susceptible creature, and calmed her troubled spirits. She showed him the way out, and, walking after him, took, childlike, two or three skips for joy. He said, drily, "Little fool!" ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet
... to that," Lessingham assured her. "In my own heart I feel convinced that I have come here on a fool's errand. No object that I could possibly attain in this neighbourhood is worth the life of ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... "A fool for luck, they say," she muttered. "I wonder what intuition induced me to interview Jake Kasker. The clothing merchant isn't a bad fellow," she continued to herself, looking over the notes she had made on her tablets. "He didn't make a ...
— Mary Louise and the Liberty Girls • Edith Van Dyne (AKA L. Frank Baum)
... at him wistfully, recognizing the truth that he never could understand the sort of feeling that led her into making, as he considered, such a fool of herself. Miss Davis gazed at her kindly and pityingly, thinking of how many hard blows she would get in the future, in return for acts like that which had so puzzled Mark. And she resolved that another time she would be slow in blaming any eccentric conduct in Hetty, and would wait ...
— Hetty Gray - Nobody's Bairn • Rosa Mulholland
... are such a fool, said King Haraldr, that you have not heard about the war between these two countries? Or do you think your luck so good that you will be able to bring valuable possessions to Denmark, while others cannot get there unmolested, even ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... a step or two forward, but Lady Chillington waved her fiercely back. "Fool! fool! why don't you go away?" she cried. "Why do you stare at me so? Go away, and send Dance to me. You have spoilt ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 4, April, 1891 • Various
... 'You are a fool!' said her grandmother sternly. 'And I have nothing more to say to you. Go away, and ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... we all knew 'twas the wrong thing to do." Said the chickens. "Of course," said the cat; "I suppose," cried the mule, "some folks think me a fool; But I'm not quite so simple as that; The poor calf never ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... Ecclesiastes seems to have had the same thought in his mind, when he says, "He who increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow." I have not written the above with the object of drawing the conclusion, that ignorance is more excellent than knowledge, or that a wise man is on a par with a fool in controlling his emotions, but because it is necessary to know the power and the infirmity of our nature, before we can determine what reason can do in restraining the emotions, and what is beyond her ...
— Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata - Part I: Concerning God • Benedict de Spinoza
... then to have a wretched puling fool, A whining mammet, in her fortune's tender, To answer: 'I'll not wed,'—'I cannot love.'" (Romeo and ...
— The Romance of Words (4th ed.) • Ernest Weekley
... his Paris bankers if I ever needed his help, wished me good luck, and bade me good-by. All this he did almost coldly; and I often wondered whether he was in a hurry to get rid of what he considered a fool, or whether he was striving ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... an ole woman like me want to put on any sech fool finery? He's de bestest boy in de worl', he is. Dat is, onless dar ain't not'in' happened ...
— Dab Kinzer - A Story of a Growing Boy • William O. Stoddard
... Stuart's after the audience of those damned Muscovites: the king arrived there just before me; and as if the duke had sworn to pursue me wherever I went that day, he came in just after me. The conversation turned upon the extraordinary appearance of the ambassadors. I know not where that fool Crofts had heard that all these Muscovites had handsome wives; and that all their wives had handsome legs. Upon this the king maintained, that no woman ever had such handsome legs as Miss Stuart; and she to prove the truth of his majesty's assertion, with the greatest imaginable ...
— Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy
... me!" cried Dan in a hoarse whisper. "But I'm awfully glad you've come." Dan's face was perfectly white, and he was trembling visibly. "Kitty, what can I do? I have been such a—such a fool; worse than a fool. Look!" holding up a paper partly burnt, and pointing to a scorched mark on ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... me, alas, she weepeth! Fool! in me what folly creepeth? Was I to blaspheme enraged, Where my soul I have engaged? Dan, dan, Dan, dan, And wretched I must yield to this; The fault ...
— A Defence of Poesie and Poems • Philip Sidney
... "I was a damn' fool, Jim," he said bluntly. "Forget it, if you can, and take a passenger back to the States with you. Or tell me to go to hell—and I guess I'll tuck my tail ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... in the new ideas. Froebel was fortunate in securing as one of his most ardent disciples, just before his death, the Baroness Bertha von Marenholtz Bulow-Wendhausen (1810-93), who did more than any other person to make his work known. Meeting, in 1849, the man mentioned to her as "an old fool," she understood him, and spent the remainder of her life in bringing to the attention of the world the work of this unworldly man who did not know how to make it known for himself. In 1851 the Prussian Government, fearing some revolutionary ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY
... be more than it. Our history moves in cycles, it is true, ever returning toward the point whence it started; but it is in the imperfect circles of a spiral it moves; it returns—but ever to a point above the former: even the second childhood, at which the fool jeers, is the better, the truer, the fuller childhood, growing strong to cast off altogether, with the husk of its own enveloping age, that of its family, its country, its world as well. Age is not all decay: it is the ripening, the swelling of the fresh ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald
... much in the manner in which Shakspeare's fools and jesters—in some respects the wisest and thoughtfullest characters in his works—talk. If his words be "light as air," they vent "truths deep as the centre." If the Fool in "Lear" had written letters to his friends and acquaintances, I think they would have marvellously resembled this epistle to Patmore; and if, in saying this, I compliment the Fool, I hope I do not derogate from the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... a wondrous fashion. Poor fool! His food and drink are not of earth. An inward impulse hurries him afar, Himself half conscious of his frenzied mood; From heaven claimeth he the fairest star, And from the earth craves every highest good, And ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... man gratefully acknowledged the kind offer, and, asking the name of the friendly chief, was informed that it was Hintza. Just then a court fool or jester stepped forward, and cried aloud his announcements of the events of the day, mixed with highly complimentary praises of his master. Stephen did not understand all he said, but he gathered thus much,—that ...
— The Settler and the Savage • R.M. Ballantyne
... often thought if the Minds of Men were laid open, we should see but little Difference between that of the Wise Man and that of the Fool. There are infinite Reveries, numberless Extravagancies, and a perpetual Train of Vanities which pass through both. The great Difference is that the first knows how to pick and cull his Thoughts for Conversation, by suppressing some, and communicating others; ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... expressive of confidence and scorn. "You were n't such a little fool as to suppose I intended to stand on the back of a street-car all my life, were you? Five years of that sort of thing is about enough for me, and I 've worked it for all it was worth." A desire to impress her overcame ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... Divorce,' Wherein the trivial Author of that Answer is discovver'd, the licenser conferr'd with, and the Opinion which they traduce defended. By the former author, J. M. Prov. xxvi. 5. Answer a Fool according to his folly, lest hee bee wise in his own conceit. Printed ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... me; I could lie down and die sometimes. A poor fool of a fellow, and yet feeling thrust upon an sorts of great and unspeakable paths, instead of being left in peace to classify butterflies ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... of the whole upper Mississippi Valley have been combed year after year by the guns of the market shooters. Often the migratory game was located by telegraphic reports. Game birds were slain by the wagon-load, boat-load, barrel, and car-load, "for the Chicago market." And the fool farmers of the Middle West stolidly plowed their fields and fed their hogs, and permitted the slaughter to go on. To-day the sons of those farmers go to the museums and zoological parks of the cities to see specimens of pinnated grouse, crane, woodcock, ducks and other species that the market ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... Wharf Rat, who was sitting in the crowd of meadow people, got up and softly tiptoed away when he thought no one was looking. But old Mother Nature saw him. You can't fool old Mother Nature. No, Sir, you can't fool old Mother Nature, and it's of ...
— Mother West Wind's Children • Thornton W. Burgess
... a fool to think I am going to you at this time of the night, without knowing who you ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... have indeed a confounded parcel of it. But, if men of parts may not be allowed to be in vain, who should! and yet, upon second thoughts, men of parts have the least occasion of any to be vain; since the world (so few of them are there in it) are ready to find them out, and extol them. If a fool can be made sensible that there is a man who has more understanding than himself, he is ready enough to conclude, that such a man must ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... 1561] When the Estates of Brabant stopped the payment of the principal tax or "Bede," [2] and when the people of Brussels took as a party uniform a costume derived from the carnival, a black cloak covered with red fool's heads, the cardinal, whose red hat was caricatured thereby, stated that nothing less than a republic was aimed at. This was true, though in the anticipation of the nobles, at least, the republic should have a decidedly ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... the Webers, I do assure, is not the fact. I was a fool about Madame Lange, I own; but what is a man not when he is in love? But I did love her truly, and even now I feel that she is not indifferent to me; it is perhaps, therefore, fortunate that her husband is a jealous booby and never leaves ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... ground. "I've got no objection to a frolic, Jude," he observed quietly, on hearing the first mention of the matter, "but I wouldn't have no play-party at this house. Hit's too handy to that cussed still of Blatch's. A passel of fool boys is mighty apt to go over thar an' fill theirselves up with corn whiskey, an' the party will just about end ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... thought he had ricked his arm at first, as it felt numb and useless. Meanwhile a great pal of his in the regiment, hearing that he had gone out like this, hops over the parapet and sets off to look for him, and comes up just as he gets hit. The second man upbraids the first roundly for being a fool, carries his rifle for him, and brings him back. All this is done quite in the day's work and "sub rosa," as they would get punished for leaving the trench like that in the daytime if it was spotted. The pluck of these ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... a world apart from the vulgar, the most lenient apprehension of him is that his is a sort of fool's paradise. One of the most curious features in the relation of literature to life is this, that while poetry, the production of the poet, is as necessary to universal man as the atmosphere, and as acceptable, the poet is regarded with that mingling of compassion and undervaluation, ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... do so, I could come to his house some Saturday night and stay over Sunday. He said that the boy was "a perfect little case to carry on and folks didn't know whether he would develop into a condemb fool or a youmerist." So he wanted a piece of one of them tomfoolery kind for the little cuss to speak the last ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... promise; and that among other qualifications for the members that are to be chosen, one is, that no man, nor the son of any man that hath been in arms during the life of the father, shall be capable of being chosen to sit in Parliament. To Will's, where like a fool I staid and lost 6d. at cards. So home, and wrote a letter to my Lord by the post. So after supper to bed. This day, by an order of the House, Sir H. Vane was sent out of town to ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... "you are talking of what you just utterly don't understand; and I am a fool for bothering you with it. Come! let us make it up and ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell |
