"Prolix" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... serious. After listening to a dozen prolix stories from people who merely wished to "talk" but had nothing ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... description is necessarily prolix, the washing itself ought to be very expeditiously performed; there should be no dawdling over it, otherwise the body will become chilled, and harm instead of good will be the result. If due dispatch be used, the whole of the body might, according ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse
... for the interior of the island, and without meeting with anything beyond the ordinary routine of bad bush and mountain travelling; certainly encountering nothing that would justify me in inflicting a prolix description upon the reader—we arrived late on the following evening at the rendezvous, found the 'Daylight' safely at anchor, and thus completed one portion of our search, without having obtained the faintest clue to an elucidation of the mystery ...
— Australian Search Party • Charles Henry Eden
... unconscious: that he was a wild Arab lion of the desert, and did speak-out with that great thunder-voice of his, not by words which he thought to be great, but by actions, by feelings, by a history which were great! His Koran has become a stupid piece of prolix absurdity; we do not believe, like him that God wrote that! The Great Man here too, as always' is a Force of Nature: whatsoever is truly great in him springs-up from the ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... was too prolix for insertion; it was a curious compound dissertation upon love and physic, united. There was devoted attention, extreme gentle treatment, study of pathology, advantage of medical attendance always at hand, careful ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... thought, feeling, and speech, that in every form was disagreeable to him; alike in the gloom of Pascal's reveries, and in the inflation of speech of some of the heroes of Corneille. He failed to relish even Montaigne as he ought to have done, because Montaigne's method was too prolix, his scepticism too universal, his egoism too manifest, and because he did not ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol 2 of 3) - Essay 1: Vauvenargues • John Morley
... called) in America had been hitherto mere puffery—puffery for the most part of weak, prolix, commonplace scribblings of little would-be authors and poets. A reformation in criticism, therefore, Edgar Poe conceived to be the only remedy for the prevalent mediocrity in writing that was vitiating the taste of the day, the only hope of placing American literature upon ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... connexion with it is of an old standing, since, shortly after he was called to the bar in 1792, it was pointed out to him by Robert M'Intosh, Esq., one of the counsel in the case, then and long after remarkable for the interest which he took, and the management which he possessed, in the prolix and complicated affairs ...
— Trial of Duncan Terig, alias Clerk, and Alexander Bane Macdonald • Sir Walter Scott
... the other six Hells are personified as feminine; and (woman-like) they are somewhat addicted to prolix speechification. ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... reasons for his substituting a table of contents for his introduction in the sixth edition. To print both would have been too prolix, even for Richardson; and it seems that the table of contents, detailing the entire action, together with the change to big quarto volumes, are Richardson's efforts to authenticate Pamela in the face of Chandler's and Kelly's unauthorized sequel, Pamela's Conduct in High Life, printed to complete ...
— Samuel Richardson's Introduction to Pamela • Samuel Richardson
... oligarchical government prevailed at St. Gall and Schaffhausen. The Junker, in the latter place, rendered themselves especially ridiculous by the innumerable offices and chambers in which they transacted their useless and prolix affairs. In all these aristocratic cantons, the peasantry were cruelly harassed, oppressed, and, in some parts, kept in servitude, by the provincial governors. The wealthy provincial governments were monopolized by the great aristocratic families.[1] Even in the pure ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks
... them, to take the trouble of forwarding these to my publisher, who will give me notice of them, that I may endeavor to subjoin at the same time my reply; and in this way readers seeing both at once will more easily determine where the truth lies; for I do not engage in any case to make prolix replies, but only with perfect frankness to avow my errors if I am convinced of them, or if I cannot perceive them, simply to state what I think is required for defense of the matters I have written, adding thereto no explication of any new matte that it may not be necessary to ...
— A Discourse on Method • Rene Descartes
... I have been very prolix upon this man, but the extraordinary singularity of his life, and my close connexion with him, appear to me sufficient excuses for making him known, especially as he did not sufficiently figure in general affairs to expect much notice in the ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... destroyed the property committed to his charge. I do not in conscience feel that your Majesty is under any obligation in this country, beyond that of rendering justice for past excesses. I could easily give your Majesty a detailed account; but, not to be prolix, I shall leave it until the especial thing that demands reform here has been somewhat remedied—and this is in regard to the soldiers of this land. For in their begging for favor they are all in need of reform; for it is through many sicknesses, and through being ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume VIII (of 55), 1591-1593 • Emma Helen Blair
... things.' So in like manner will all the emphasis and elaboration in the literature of sensuality become a weariness without meaning, also. Congreve's caustic wit will turn to spasmodic truism; and Theophile Gautier's excess of erotic ardour, into prolix and fantastic affectation. All its sublimity, its brilliance, and a large part of its interest, depend in art on the existence of the moral sense, and would in its absence be absolutely unproducible. The reason of this is plain. The natural pains and pleasures of life, merely manipulated by the ...
— Is Life Worth Living? • William Hurrell Mallock
... intellectual interest, and in some of practical interest also, we cannot help thinking that his biography would have gained by greater exercise of self-denial on the part of his biographer. It is altogether too prolix, and the distinction is not sufficiently observed between what is interesting simply to the Bunsen family and their friends, and what is interesting to the public. One of the points in which biographers, and the present author among the number, make mistakes, is in their use of letters. They never ...
— Occasional Papers - Selected from The Guardian, The Times, and The Saturday Review, - 1846-1890 • R.W. Church
... imagination of the Highland Seer. Harrison, in his ride, encountered some such report concerning the event of the battle, and turned his horse back to Tillietudlem in great dismay. He made it his first business to seek out the Major, and interrupted him in the midst of a prolix account of the siege and storm of Dundee, with the ejaculation, "Heaven send, Major, that we do not see a siege of Tillietudlem before we are ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... ignorant enough to compare Schiller with Shakspeare; yet, merely as illustration, I would say that we should proceed to the perusal of Wallenstein, not from Lear or Othello, but from Richard II., or the three parts of Henry VI. We scarcely expect rapidity in an historical drama; and many prolix speeches are pardoned from characters whose names and actions have formed the most amusing tales of our early life. On the other hand, there exist in these plays more individual beauties, more passages whose excellence will bear reflection than in the former productions ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... style,' says the uncourtly biographer, "abounds to overflowing in what is called in England Parliamentary circumlocution, in which, instead of direct, simple expressions, bombastic paraphrases are always chosen, which become in the end intolerably prolix and dull, and are enough to drive a foreigner to despair." The style is indeed august; but the real penman is not the King, whose strong point was not grammatical composition, but some confidant, very likely Sir Herbert Taylor, who was employed by the King ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... without system, or order, as they have presented themselves, and have been related in a manner which I have attempted to make entertaining and instructive, without being prolix or tedious. They will be chiefly interesting to the people of the South; though much may, and, I hope, will be read by those of the North. Some of my happiest days have been passed in the North: at Cambridge some of my sons have been educated, and some of my dearest friends have been Northern ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... the first who dared to cross the threshold of the church, which he did, however, not for his own benefit, but to do honor to the memory of Leo I. The inscription in which he describes the event is too prolix to be given here. It tells us that the grave of Leo the Great was in the vestibule below the sacristy. There he lay "like the keeper of the temple, like a shepherd watching his flock." But other graves had crowded the ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani
... of the Banims in literature is to be estimated from the merits of the O'Hara Tales; their later works, though of considerable ability, are sometimes prolix and are marked by too evident an imitation of the Waverley Novels. The Tales, however, are masterpieces of faithful delineation. The strong passions, the lights and shadows of Irish peasant character, have rarely been so ably and truly depicted. The incidents are striking, sometimes ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... to the chronicles of all the village families, robustly and unimaginatively told by the parson's wife; meanwhile I, tortured by intolerable ennui, pumped up questions, tried a hundred subjects with my worthy host. He told me long and prolix stories, he discoursed on rural needs. At last I said that we must be going; he replied with genuine disappointment that the night was still young, and that it was a pity to break up our pleasant confabulation. I saw with a shock of wonder ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... it is ably done," continued his majesty, still attentively observing him. "You will acknowledge that it is exceedingly difficult to render the concise style of Tacitus into the prolix, long-winded German?" ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... in the forest, amid annoyances and interruptions of all kinds. In respect to the value of their contents, they are exceedingly unequal. Modest records of marvellous adventures and sacrifices, and vivid pictures of forest-life, alternate with prolix and monotonous details of the conversion of individual savages, and the praiseworthy deportment of some exemplary neophyte. With regard to the condition and character of the primitive inhabitants of North America, it is impossible to exaggerate their value as ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... answered him. He therefore wrote him a little billet, saying, "My dear Petrarch, where have you hid yourself, and whither have you vanished? What is the meaning of all this?" The poet received this note at Vaucluse, and sent an explanation of his flight, sincere indeed as to good feelings, but prolix as usual in the expression of them. Pastrengo sent him a kind reply, and soon afterwards did him the still greater favour of visiting him at Vaucluse, and helping ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... prolix account of an altogether imaginary adventure, he had started to his feet, and accompanied his speech with a series of pantomimic gestures; dancing and flinging his arms about, as he professed to have done while defending himself against the footpads. The grotesqueness of the performance, ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid
... typical cases, he would have been more effective in a literary sense. His passion for 'codification,' for tabulating and arranging facts in all their complexity, and for applying his doctrine at full length to every case that he can imagine, makes him terribly prolix. On the other hand, this process no doubt strengthened his own conviction and the conviction of his disciples as to the value of his process. Follow this clue of utility throughout the whole labyrinth, see what a clear answer it offers at every point, and you cannot ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen
... left to be suggested to your Piety verbally by the bearers of this letter, that on the one hand this epistolary speech of ours may not become too prolix, and on the other that nothing may be omitted which would ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin
... be too prolix on this subject, it may be said, shortly, that when the chain and sinker of the next buoy were being hauled in, a three-inch rope snapped and grazed the finger of a man, fortunately taking no more ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... right. He knew nothing of the forms of the House;—was more ignorant of them than an ordinary schoolboy;—but on that very account felt less trepidation than might another parliamentary novice. Mr Brown was tedious and prolix; and Melmotte, though he thought much of his project and had almost told himself that he would do the thing, was still doubting, when, suddenly, Mr Brown sat down. There did not seem to be any particular end to the speech, nor had Melmotte followed any general thread of argument. ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... writers: and the collection of his letters appended to Southey's biography forms, with the biographical portions of his poetry, the materials for a sketch of his life. Southey's biography itself is very helpful, though too prolix and too much filled out with dissertations for common readers. Had its author only done for Cowper what he did for Nelson! [Our acknowledgments are also due to Mr. Benham, the writer of the Memoir prefixed to the Globe ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith
... driven out to a point on the shore beyond the Third Beach, where the Norsemen were supposed to have landed during their apocryphal visit to this continent. It had been a hot drive, but when we stopped, a keen wind was blowing in from the sea. During a pause in the prolix address that followed, a coachman’s voice was heard to mutter, “If he jaws much longer all the horses will be foundered,” which brought the learned address to an ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... to Bergenheim's prolix explanations, interested himself in the planting of trees, thought the fields very green, the forests admirable, the granite rocks more beautiful than those of the Alps, went into ecstasies over the smallest vista, advised the establishment ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... be amused. Bismillah! he wills it so. If the story-teller becomes prolix and tedious—the bow-string and the sack, and two Nubians to drop him into the Piscataqua! But truly, Jack, I have a hard task. There is literally nothing here—except the little girl over the way. She is swinging in the hammock at this moment. It is to me compensation for many ...
— Marjorie Daw • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... vein of the extremest circumstantiality. With deliberate malice I loaded a prolix narrative with every triviality that a fairly retentive memory could rake out of the half-forgotten past. I cudgelled my brains for irrelevant incidents. I described with the minutest accuracy things that had not the faintest significance. I drew a vivid picture ...
— The Mystery of 31 New Inn • R. Austin Freeman
... Mr. Grevenkop, of the 21st February, N. S., I find that you had been a great while without receiving any letters from me; but by this time, I daresay you think you have received enough, and possibly more than you have read; for I am not only a frequent, but a prolix correspondent. ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... follows; and we have his story given us by Mr. M'Combie, in a simple unassuming little volume—not to be read without many thoughts, perhaps not rightly without tears. Mr. M'Combie has been wise enough not to attempt panegyric. He is all but prolix in details, filling up some half of his volume with letters of preternatural length from Alexander to his publishers and critics, and from the said publishers and critics to Alexander, altogether of an unromantic and business- like cast, but entirely successful ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... getting prolix, I shall hurry over the next few years I remained in Leeds. I became a partner of the house; our transactions were very extensive, more particularly in the United States of America, where we were deeply engaged in the cotton trade. It was judged necessary that one of the firm should be on ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton
... your apology; and if you must leave us so soon as you say, what signifies how you stand in his honours good graces?And I warn you that the Essay on Castrametation is something prolix, and will occupy the time we can spare after dinner, so you may lose the Ossianic Controversy if we do not dedicate this morning to it. We will go out to my ever-green bower, my sacred holly-tree yonder, and have ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... denied to his predecessors to hear even through report. Had I not already given your Majesty news of many other things which occur here, I would not dare to omit them now, even if I might be considered prolix. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, V7, 1588-1591 • Emma Helen Blair
... ancient and modern Cacklogallinians. The former, tho' tenacious of their Liberty, were remarkable for their Loyalty; and each thought it his peculiar Interest zealously to promote that of the Publick. But not to be prolix in the Character of the old Cacklogallinians, I shall give it in few Words. They were what the English now are, Wise, Modest, Brave, Human, Loyal, Publick-spirited, capable of governing their own, and conquering ...
— A Voyage to Cacklogallinia - With a Description of the Religion, Policy, Customs and Manners of That Country • Captain Samuel Brunt
... neither injurious nor profitable; and if he repeats nothing more than once; and if he does not at once begin with that topic which was last mentioned;—and the imitation of brevity takes in many people, so that, when they think that they are being brief, they are exceedingly prolix, while they are taking pains to say many things with brevity, not absolutely to say but few things and no more than are necessary. For to many men a man appears to speak with brevity who says, "I went to the house; I called out the servant; ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero
... the hall and the sitting was resumed. The jurors were required to give reasons for their verdict, and each spoke in turn facing the empty chair. Some were prolix, others confined themselves to a sentence; one or ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... write another of equal length; though I hasten to add that neither contingency is in the least probable. In very few men is found the power of sustained conception necessary to the successful composition of so prolix a tale; and certainly I have never betrayed the ownership of such a qualification. The tale, nevertheless, is an irrevocable fact; and my present business it is ...
— Confessions and Criticisms • Julian Hawthorne
... likewise, and all the musicians sound their instruments, till the khan has done drinking. If I were to describe all the pomp and magnificence of these festivals, and all die dainties and delicate dishes which are served up, I should become prolix ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... Moore (1729-1802), the father of the celebrated Sir John Moore, published Zeluco. Various views of Human Nature, taken from Life and Manners, Foreign and Domestic, in 1789. Zeluco was an unmitigated scoundrel, who led an adventurous life; but the prolix narrative of his villanies does not recall Childe Harold. There is, perhaps, some resemblance between Zeluco's unbridled childhood and youth, due to the indulgence of a doting mother, and Byron's early emancipation from discipline ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... have been given to the world, somewhat prolix and trite, but illustrative of the familiar and practical manner in which Augustine Washington, in the daily intercourse of domestic life, impressed the ductile mind of his child with high maxims of religion and virtue, and imbued him with a spirit of justice and generosity, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... the oldest man present, was entitled to the position of spokesman; and he made a very prolix statement of all the events which had transpired since he first ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic
... for this girl assisted me in bearing the braggadocio of her brother, who did not always keep within bounds. I had often to endure prolix accounts of his exploits,—how he had already often fought, without wishing to injure the other, all for the mere sake of honor. He had always contrived to disarm his adversary, and had then forgiven him; nay, he was such a good fencer, that he was once very much perplexed ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... trumpets as to its moral purpose; latter-day criticism may take sides for or against the novel-with-a-purpose, but that Richardson justified his fiction writing upon moral grounds and upon those alone is shown in the descriptive title-page of the tale, too prolix to be often recalled and a good sample in its long-windedness of the past compared with the terse brevity of the present in this matter: "Published in order to cultivate the principles of virtue and religion in the mind of youth of both sexes"; the author of "Sanford and ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton
... at the outset, by a humorous allusion to the prolix speaker who had preceded him. "Look at the clock, gentlemen," he said; "and limit my speech to an interval of ten minutes." The applause which followed was heard, through the broken window, in the street. The ...
— I Say No • Wilkie Collins
... very prolix here; for I cannot overlook a single incident connected with this eventful journey. Never did any one less anticipate a blessing or look for happiness than I in visiting Ireland. I cannot enter into more particulars, because it would involve the names of friends ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... published, in three volumes quarto, by Thomas Ledyard, who had accompanied him in many of his later travels, and had been the spectator of some of the last of his military exploits. This is a work of much higher authority, and contains much valuable information; but it is prolix, long-winded, and diffuse, filled with immaterial documents, and written throughout in a tone of inflated panegyric. III. Another life of Marlborough, written with more ability, appeared at Paris in 1806, in three ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... (l. liii. p. 698) gives us a prolix and bombast speech on this great occasion. I have borrowed from Suetonius and Tacitus the general ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... Coppelius is not to blame for it. I must tell you that yesterday I asked our experienced neighbour, the chemist, whether in experiments of this kind an explosion could take place which would have a momentarily fatal effect. He said, "Oh, certainly!" and described to me in his prolix and circumstantial way how it could be occasioned, mentioning at the same time so many strange and funny words that I could not remember them at all. Now I know you will be angry at your Clara, and will say, "Of the Mysterious which often clasps man in its invisible arms ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... talents and his modesty—would seem, as far as I was able to judge by turning over the pages hastily, to be composed in a remarkably clear style, and to abound with naive phrases and genuine expressions of the king himself, wrought into the mass and substance of a prolix theological dissertation, that no doubt was prepared and digested for the purpose by the divines of the period. With regard to the correspondence with Anne Boleyn, which places the royal author altogether ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... take a great many words to explain why my little suburban retreat, on which I had prided myself for so many years of my bachelor life, was a mass of conglomerated wreckage. I will be as brief as I can. I am not a prolix man; I know the value of time, and of other people's time. I should not have had a flourishing business in Bermondsey, if I didn't know. Golden Birch Villa, Streatham, then, had been burgled. Broken into, despoiled and defaced, was my little country retreat from the turmoil of town, and ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... hardly well seated in the House before we were made sensible, that it was the Custom, which had made it the business of our Host, to entertain all his Guests at first coming in, with a prolix Account of that remarkable Interview between the two Kings of France and Spain. I speak safely now, as being got on French Ground: For the Spaniard in his own Country would have made me to know, that putting Spain after ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... his strictures upon persons in authority, and upon current notions; and was constantly being warned that if he should publish such or such a work he would surely be prosecuted. Numerous books were therefore not published until many years after they were written. His literary style became so prolix and unintelligible that his disciples—Dumont, Mill, and others—came to his rescue, and disentangled and prepared for the press his innumerable pamphlets, full of suggestiveness and teeming with projects of reform more or less completely ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... the ear for music. Possibly we are entering on an age in which the people care less for form, for phraseology, than for what seems to them true, real—for what, as they would express it, "takes hold of them." This is no plea or excuse for careless work, but rather a suggestion that the day of prolix, fine, flowery writing is passing. The immense number of well-written books in circulation has made success with careless, slovenly manuscripts impossible. Publishers and editors will not even read, much ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... with amusement and delight. Abstracts from the most popular publications will be given, accompanied with short critical remarks upon them, and, whatever appears most interesting in the periodical productions of Great Britain will be transferred into this; pruned if they be prolix, and illustrated by explanatory notes, whenever they may be found obscured by ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter
... sweep the hearth, as it were, in these opening pages, before sitting down to tell his story. He does not intend to frighten the reader away by prolix explanation, but he does mean to warn him against hasty judgments when facts are related which are not within the range of every-day experience. Did he ever see the Siamese twins, or any pair like them? Probably not, yet ...
— A Mortal Antipathy • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... of Sir Thopas," as it is generally called, is introduced by Chaucer as a satire on the dull, pompous, and prolix metrical romances then in vogue. It is full of phrases taken from the popular rhymesters in the vein which he holds up to ridicule; if, indeed — though of that there is no evidence — it be not actually part of an old romance which ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... what adroitness and readiness of resource one of the Friars of St. Antony avoided a pickle that two young men had in readiness for him. Nor, if, in order to do the story full justice, I be somewhat prolix of speech, should it be burdensome to you, if you will but glance at the sun, which is yet ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... confidence that this unbosoming deserved. They were long blase on oaths; they numbered among themselves veterans and virtuosi of perjury. The passage about the army did not, however, escape them. They observed with annoyance that the message, despite its prolix enumeration of the lately enacted laws, passed, with affected silence, over the most important of all, the election law, and, moreover, in case no revision of the Constitution was held, left the choice of the President, ...
— The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte • Karl Marx
... him at Beaconsfield their disposition and prospects. Richard Burke was received with many compliments, but of course nothing came of his mission, and the only impression that remains with the reader of his prolix story is his tale of the two royal brothers, who afterwards became Louis XVIII. and Charles X., meeting after some parting, and embracing one another with many tears on board a boat in the middle of the Rhine, while some of the courtiers raised a cry of "Long live the king"—the king ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... not help laying great stress on the degree and manner in which this element enters into the composition of the New Testament; that ethical truths are there expressed in every variety of form which can fix them upon the imagination and the heart, with an entire absence of those prolix discussions and metaphysical refinements which form so large a portion of Aristotle and Plato. If we find in these writers a moral truth expressed with something approaching the comprehensive beauty and simplicity of the Gospels, we are filled ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... the reign of Tiberius. His work is a collection of anecdotes entitled "Memorable Sayings and Deeds," the object of which was to illustrate by examples the beauty of virtue and the deformity of vice. The style is prolix and declamatory, and characterized by awkward affectation and ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... skill of a scholar, a sureness and delicacy of insight at once sympathetic and critical, the soul of a poet, and a patience as untiring as it is rewarding; qualities rare indeed, and still more rarely blended. Prolific but seldom prolix, he writes with grace, ease, and lucidity, albeit in a style often opulent, and touched at times with lights and jewels from old alchemists, antique liturgies, remote and haunting romance, secret orders ...
— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton
... proceedings. The "Memoir," written by an old man who had squandered his energies and sunk into deserved obscurity, is tedious and magniloquent, and sometimes inaccurate. Moreover, Dillon has not always chosen the extracts judiciously. Clark's decidedly prolix speeches to the Indians are given with intolerable repetition. They were well suited to the savages, drawing the causes of the quarrel between the British and Americans in phrases that could be understood by the Indian mind; but their ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Two - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1777-1783 • Theodore Roosevelt
... courage, which gave an appearance of resolution and confidence to all his actions, and inspired his friends with admiration and excessive devotion to him, and caused him to be respected by his most violent opponents. As a speaker he was prolix, monotonous, and never eloquent, except, perhaps, for a few minutes when provoked into a passion by something which had fallen out in debate. But, notwithstanding these defects, and still more the ridicule ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... this street, or because there is a river. A thing may exist without there being a law for it. There is no law for building this house, and yet it is built. There is no law for making Dr. Verse a better preacher than Dr. Prolix, and yet he is a much better preacher; neither is there any law for making Mr. Effingham a more finished gentleman than I happen to be, and yet I am not fool enough to deny the fact. In the way of making out a bill of parcels, ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... one way out of this difficulty. The main incidents of the Epic are narrated in the original work in passages which are neither diffuse nor unduly prolix, and which are interspersed in the leading narrative of the Epic, at that narrative itself is interspersed in the midst of more lengthy episodes. The more carefully I examined the arrangement, the more clearly it appeared to me that these main incidents of the Epic would ...
— Maha-bharata - The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse • Anonymous
... a plan less labored and prolix than that which it seemed necessary to adopt in treating of Antigua. As that part of the testimony which respects the abolition of slavery, and the sentiments of the planters is substantially the same with what is recorded in the foregoing pages, we shall be content with presenting it in the ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... pray, do not be prolix. I have listened already a long time, and it is reasonable that I should speak in ...
— The Love-Tiff • Moliere
... likes their king—Theodoric is his name. A man of blood he has been in his youth: but he has settled down, like his people; and here is a picture of him. A real photograph of a live old Goth, nearly 1400 years ago. Gibbon gives a good translation of it. I will give you one, but Sidonius is prolix and florid, and ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... good deal may be done in dispute by calling a man an ass or a knave,—but the resolve to use the words should have been made only at the moment, and they should come hot from the heart. There was much neatness and some acuteness in Mr. Daubeny's satire, but there was no heat, and it was prolix. It had, however, the effect of irritating Mr. Gresham,—as was evident from the manner in which he moved his hat and ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... was not mistaken; my interest, which was deeply awakened, received a strong whet from the narrative which Mr. Sheepshanks related, and though wearied with the day's adventure, I did not go to rest till I had heard the conclusion of his somewhat prolix story. I afterwards happened to know more, indeed, of the circumstances alluded to; and though the day's incident was of a frightful nature, yet I look back upon it as the means of introducing me to the knowledge of events ...
— Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 475 - Vol. XVII, No. 475. Saturday, February 5, 1831 • Various
... both sides of an argument. This rhetorical device, so wearisome to modern readers, is used by Chretien preferably when some sentiment or deep emotion is to be portrayed. Ovid may well have suggested the device, but Ovid never abuses it as does the more prolix mediaeval poet. For the part playing by the eyes in mediaeval love sophistry, see J.F. Hanford, "The Debate of Heart and Eye" in "Modern Language Notes", xxvi. 161-165; and H.R. Lang, "The Eyes as Generators ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... recollections of English mountains and lakes. The attempt to blend into a single picture a landscape actually seen and a landscape only known at second-hand may perhaps account for the lack of distinctness in her pictures. Her descriptions of scenery are elaborate, and often prolix, but it is often difficult to form a clear image of the scene. In her novels she cares for landscape only as an effective background, and paints with the broad, careless sweep of the theatrical scene-painter. ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... poems, the poems of England and Germany give indication of a progress in style from a more archaic and repressed, to a more developed and more prolix kind of narrative. The difference is considerable between Hildebrand and ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... with some difficulty, seated himself on the rock, and with glaring eyes—so interested was he in a project which was to put twenty thousand dollars in his pocket—he listened to the rather prolix explanations of his companion. For twenty thousand dollars he would have sold his ...
— Freaks of Fortune - or, Half Round the World • Oliver Optic
... accusation so complicated cannot be confuted without a long recapitulation of past events, and a deduction of many particular circumstances, some of which may require evidence, and some a very minute and prolix explication, I cannot think this a proper day for engaging in the controversy, because it is my interest that ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... Albert is filled with alarm. He is indeed betwixt two fires. Gioberti has published one of his prolix, weak addresses, in which, he says, that in the beginning of every revolution one must fix a limit beyond which he will not go; that, for himself, he has done it,—others are passing beyond his mark, and he will not go any farther. Of the want of thought, of insight into ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... Jackson (the Emperor of Pugilism) and another of the select, at Crib's the champion's. I drank more than I like, and have brought away some three bottles of very fair claret—for I have no headach. We had Tom * * up after dinner;—very facetious, though somewhat prolix. He don't like his situation—wants to fight again—pray Pollux (or Castor, if he was the miller) he may! Tom has been a sailor—a coal heaver—and some other genteel profession, before he took to the cestus. Tom has been in action at sea, and is now only three-and-thirty. ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... passed, and as she was very prolix, Mr Vanslyperken was a mass of snow on the windward side of him before she had finished, which she did, by pulling down her worsted stockings, and showing the wounds which she had received as her portion in the last night's ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... book," replied the priest, "is also a great friend of mine: his verses, when sung by himself, excite much admiration; indeed such is the sweetness of his voice in singing them, that they are perfectly enchanting. He is a little too prolix in his eclogues; but there can never be too much of what is really good: let it be preserved with the select. But what book ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... Portions of Thuanus his Historie, and the Letters of Theodore Bexa, concerning the French Reformed Church; oft prolix, yet interesting, especially with Mr. Agnew's Comments, and Allusions to our own Time. On the other Hand, Rose reads Davila, the sworne Apologiste of Catherine de' Medicis, whose charming Italian even I can comprehende; but alle is false and plausible. ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... who has displayed so great liberality to us who have recently turned to Him." I might say more as to the Gospel of St. John, the saving sign of the cross, and other mysteries of the Christians, whose marvelous efficacy these tribes have experienced; but I would not be prolix. Let it be enough to state that seven or eight sick persons at least have been cured by amulets ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVII, 1609-1616 • Various
... Many of our poets use blank verse, as many other people walk, as if they had no sense of rhythm within them; but Milton, by reason of his long study and practice of music, seems to be always writing to melody. In consequence it is easy to read his most prolix passages, as it is easy to walk over almost any kind of ground if one but keeps step to outward or inward music. Not only is Milton's verse stately and melodious, but he is a perfect master of words, choosing them for their sound as well as for their sense, as a musician chooses ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... variety have forced us to enter into minute details requiring a considerable time to peruse. Those events which we are now about to describe also succeeded each other with marvelous speed, and occupied an incredibly short space of time, although our narrative must necessarily appear prolix ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... said, "and my brain is so easily tired out that I am forced to read a great deal to recreate myself. That's why you see me reading so much." The book in which he was at the moment seeking recreation was a ponderous work on metaphysics by a prolix Scotchman, treating in many dreary chapters of such amusing topics as the unity of the act of perception with the object perceived! As may be supposed of such a man, whose illness forbade action and whose interior trials made contemplation an agony, he chafed sometimes at his enforced inactivity, ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... season when the church was in danger, and when all good men expected they knew not what would happen to us all. I then answered boldly, if he thought I had given my promise, he affronted me in proposing any breach of it. Not to be too prolix; I persevered, and so did my nephew, in the esquire's interest, who was chose chiefly through his means; and so I lost my curacy, Well, sir, but do you think the esquire ever mentioned a word of the church? Ne verbum quidem, ut ita dicam: within two years he got a ...
— Joseph Andrews Vol. 1 • Henry Fielding
... prolix and tedious in my former purpose, it may be that it hath bred some offence, to such as dayly indeuour to occupie theyr sences in the pleasaunt discourses of loue. But it wyll also prooue no whit displeasant, if with a lyttle patience, ...
— Hypnerotomachia - The Strife of Loue in a Dreame • Francesco Colonna
... York, I found the affair which had threatened to be a prolix one, only demanded a few minutes' attention from me. I strolled into the Club; there chanced to be no one there whom I cared to see; the city was hot and ill-smelling, and I decided I could not ...
— A Village Ophelia and Other Stories • Anne Reeve Aldrich
... of old Boreas and the angry groanings of Father Neptune giving token of approaching storms, I bade farewell to Vectis, my 179friend Horace transporting me in his yacht to Southampton Water. Reader, if I should appear somewhat prolix in my descriptions, take a tour yourself to the island, visit the delightful scenery with which it abounds, participate in the aquatic excursions of the place, and meet, as I have done, with social friends, and kind hearts, and lovely forms, and your own delightful feelings will ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... in Van Lennep, who died a few years ago, a writer of historical romances which were received with enthusiasm by all classes of society. He was an effective painter of customs, a learned, witty writer, and a master of the art of dialogue and description, but, unfortunately, often prolix. He used old artifices, adopted forced solutions, and often was not sufficiently reticent. In his last book, "The Adventures of Nicoletta Zevenster," while admirably describing Dutch society at the beginning of this ...
— Holland, v. 1 (of 2) • Edmondo de Amicis
... proceed to make such extracts from his works, as seem to me most striking and important to the general reader. They are somewhat numerous, and there may be a few repetitions; but I was more anxious to preserve his exact language—which is rather prolix—than to abridge too much, at the risk ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott
... romantic name. But do not confine yourself to such Lacedaemonian brevity, Maitre Bilot; be prolix! and relate to me, minutely, everything that you know about the ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... of the Middle Ages, has literary skill, a vivid though prolix style, a keen eye for the picturesque, bold and independent judgment, wonderful breadth and range, and an insatiable curiosity. He was a man of the world, a courtier and a scholar; he took immense pains to collect his facts from ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... are self-opinionated and egoistical, with a conceit and assurance out of all proportion to their abilities. Their mental perspective is distorted and they are conspicuous for their obstinacy. In conversation they are prolix and pretentious, and they often contract religious mania, in which their actions by no means accord with their protestations, for they have very elementary notions of right and wrong, ...
— Epilepsy, Hysteria, and Neurasthenia • Isaac G. Briggs
... capture; his death had taken place early this morning, and Pennyloaf was all but crazy with grief. To Jane these things sounded so extraordinary that for some time she could scarcely put a question, but sat in dismay, listening to the woman's prolix description of all that had come to pass since Wednesday evening. At length she called for Mrs. Byass, for whose benefit the ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing
... great works of art. It was more difficult to sustain any interest in Das Wesen des Christenthums ('The Essence of Christianity') by the same author, for it was impossible whilst reading this work not to become conscious, however involuntarily, of the prolix and unskilful manner in which he dilates on the simple and fundamental idea, namely, religion explained from a purely subjective and psychological point of view. Nevertheless, from that day onward I always regarded Feuerbach as the ideal exponent of the radical release of ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... his stories into a newer generation that made them good. Sir S. Smith ("Long Acre") was a bore at the Congress of Vienna, but would have been delightful to us could we have known him.' [Footnote: Sir Sidney Smith must have been prolix over his achievements at the siege of Acre and elsewhere. It is certain that a reputation for bombast injured his career and caused his remarkable achievements to ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... on the whole were, to put the case mildly, as bad as most, in respect of giving short weight in their shops, and not speaking the truth, - I say, before this knowledge became forced upon me, their prolix addresses, their inordinate conceit, their daring ignorance, their investment of the Supreme Ruler of heaven and earth with their own miserable meannesses and littlenesses, greatly shocked me. Still, as their term for the frame of mind that could not perceive them to be in an ...
— George Silverman's Explanation • Charles Dickens
... I will inform you presently; for it was by my curiosity to view this relic of their remotest times that the visit among the Indians, alluded to in the beginning of my letter, was prompted. It has been necessary for me to be thus prolix, to make you understand the nature of the society—and a sort of danger too—by which we were surrounded. On one side, white rogues—border cutthroats—contending, through corrupted red men, for the possessions of those among ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... I may be prolix: but one must write as one walked, stopping every moment to seize something new, and longing for as many pairs of eyes as a spider—all this while, I say, we heard the roar of the trade-surf growing louder and louder in front; and pushing cautiously through the Roseau, found ourselves on ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... rather prolix on the subject of knightly honor, but I had good reason for being so, because the Augean stable of moral and intellectual enormity in this world can be cleaned out only with the besom of philosophy. There are two things which more than all else serve to make the social arrangements ...
— The Essays Of Arthur Schopenhauer: The Wisdom of Life • Arthur Schopenhauer
... have managed to do without them so long; 'method', 'methodical', 'function', 'numerous', 'penetrate', 'penetrable', 'indignity', 'savage', 'scientific', 'delineation', 'dimension'—all which he notes to have recently come up; so too 'idiom', 'significative', 'compendious', 'prolix', 'figurative', 'impression', 'inveigle', 'metrical'. All these he adduces with praise; others upon which he bestows equal commendation, have not held their ground, as 'placation', 'numerosity', 'harmonical'. Of those neologies which he disallowed, he only ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... two grievous faults: they are prolix in the particular parts and slow in the general movement. But they have passion, distinct and diversified character, and they abound in passages of great moral and poetic beauty.' ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... may be the object of desire and will. No novel, however realistic, however prolix in its descriptions, can give us more than the barest outlines of the course of life followed by the personages it attempts to portray. A touch here, a touch there, and a character is indicated. No more, for more would ...
— A Handbook of Ethical Theory • George Stuart Fullerton
... straight-forward, prosaic fashion, omitting no details in the action and unrolling endless descriptions of dresses, trappings, gardens, etc. He invented plots and situations full of fine possibilities by which later poets have profited, but his own handling of them was feeble and prolix. Yet there was a simplicity about the old French language and a certain elegance and delicacy in the diction of the trouveres which the rude, unformed English ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... Irish working classes ... it is superior to anything written by Synge, Yeats, or Shaw.... The piece, in its realism, earnest purpose, and dramatic force, is worthy of John Galsworthy, and has the additional merit of being almost entirely free from anything like special pleading. Never prolix or oratorical, the compact and homely dialogue is full of shrewd observation and sage comments, pertinent to the contributory causes of a conel private and public tragedy.... The play is as able as it is significant, one well worthy of the boards ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... such material one is apt, even unconsciously, to be egotistical, and to linger too long and too fondly over scenes and incidents of which one might say, in Virgilian phrase, quorum pars, si non magna, at parva fui. Should the reader deem any portions unduly prolix, he will, perhaps, kindly excuse it on this score. But I have known several instances, and especially of late two in this neighbourhood, when a person advanced in years and of wide experience, has passed away, ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter
... return to the Argus. It was affecting in its puffery of the beefsteak pudding that ninepence purchased in Cape Town; and poignantly prolix in its conception of how Horatius held the bridge of Modder River some five-and-twenty years ago (sic). The Boers, we gathered, had been knocked about at Ladysmith, and Mr. Morley had sympathised with them in London. All this would have been entertaining, even exciting, before ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... interest in this visit of the departed guid-man, and, having touched a chord which was extremely sensitive and not easily put to rest after having been made to vibrate, old Mrs Cameron entertained her with a sweet and prolix account of the last illness, death, and burial of the said guid-man, with the tears swelling up in her bright old eyes and hopping over her wrinkled cheeks, until Flora forbade her to say another word, reminding her of the ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... But the two townsmen don't seem to have seen much of each other in the big city. Their meetings were rare, and, so far as I can make out, for the most part accidental. But, as I said before, my oldest inhabitant is somewhat hazy, and excruciatingly prolix; his chaff is in the proportion of some fifty to one of his wheat. I've given a good deal of time to this case already, you see, Mr. Hawkehurst; and you'll find your work very smooth sailing compared to ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... other brand upon this odious and accursed civil war than that single loss, it must be most infamous and execrable to all posterity.' Now Clarendon is not a great writer, not even a good writer, for he is prolix and involved, yet we see that even Clarendon, when he comes to a matter in which his heart is engaged, becomes sweet and harmonious in his rhythm. If we turn to a prose-writer of the very first place, we are instantly conscious of a still greater difference. ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Volume I (of 3) - Essay 4: Macaulay • John Morley
... that system, minute directions for every case and occurrence that may arise. This, say they, is necessary to render a revelation perfect, especially one which has for its object the regulation of human conduct. Now, how prolix, and yet how incomplete and unavailing, such an attempt must have been, is proved by one notable example: "The Indoo and Mussulman religions are institutes of civil law, regulating the minutest questions, both of property and of all questions which come under the cognizance ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley
... author introduces an emphatically Christian digression on the horror of Mirrha's "fowle incestious lust" and on the importance of reading "Gods holy Bible" as a salve for sin (p. 253), and invents the Nurse's prolix arguments against such "filthy" love as Mirrha desires (pp. 258-261).[17] The fact that the author follows Ovid's story as closely as he does should be taken as a commentary on his limited powers of invention rather than on his devotion ...
— Seven Minor Epics of the English Renaissance (1596-1624) • Dunstan Gale |
