"Propriety" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... give up the place, both the ladies and John himself had agreed, with a thousand rapturous tears and exclamations, that he was one of the noblest young men that ever lived, had acted as became himself, and might with perfect propriety give up the place, his talents being so prodigious that no power on earth could hinder him from being Lord Chancellor. Indeed, John and Lucy had always thought the clerkship quite beneath him, and were not a little glad, perhaps, at finding a pretext for decently refusing it. But as ...
— The Bedford-Row Conspiracy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... with pain; his hands—the true index of the soul—were clasped, the fingers interlocked, wiry fingers agile with pen and piano. "Hear me out, Olivie," he commanded. "I've been too good a friend to dismiss because I've offended your sense of propriety"—she made an indignant gesture—"well, your idea of fidelity. But there is the other side of the slate: I've been a faithful slave, I've worked long years for my reward; and disciple of Nietzsche as I am, I ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... the propriety of legalising the French language in a British dominion; but any one who examines well the circumstances which induced it must see that not only justice but military expediency required liberal treatment and wide consideration for seventy thousand subjects speaking an alien tongue, if the fruits ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... great Shepherd of the sheep," and again with "the mediator of the new covenant," and again with "the second Adam." These are all figures of speech, and, taken superficially, they determine nothing as to doctrine. The propriety and the genuine character and force of the metaphor are in each case to be carefully sought with the lights of learning and under the guidance of a docile candor. The thoughts that, in consequence of transmitted sin, all departed souls of men were confined ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... of the sciences, which appears to us a decided improvement on his earlier. He adds to the six fundamental sciences of his original scale, a seventh under the name of Morals, forming the highest step of the ladder, immediately after Sociology: remarking that it might, with still greater propriety, be termed Anthropology, being the science of individual human nature, a study, when rightly understood, more special and complicated than even that of Society. For it is obliged to take into consideration ...
— Auguste Comte and Positivism • John-Stuart Mill
... haughtily. "What is vanity in you, sir, is propriety in me. You ask a Jewish price for it, Mr. Graves; but have it I will, if only ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... evening. "Lord Fawn presents his compliments to Lady Eustace. Lady Eustace will be kind enough to understand that Lord Fawn recedes altogether from the proposition made by him in his letter to Lady Eustace dated March 28th last. Should Lady Eustace think proper to call in question the propriety of this decision on the part of Lord Fawn, she had better refer the question to some friend, and Lord Fawn will do the same. Lord Fawn thinks it best to express his determination, under no circumstances, to communicate again personally with Lady Eustace on this ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... and finer feeling in regard to the propriety of preserving such national antiquities as I have referred to, subsists, I believe, in the heart of the general public of Scotland, than perhaps those who are their superiors in riches and rank generally give them credit for. Within ...
— Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson
... in the terms of the myth carries with it a notable extension in its propriety. The social and moral phenomena of human life cannot be used in interpreting life elsewhere without a certain conscious humour. This makes the charm of avowed writers of fable; their playful travesty and dislocation of things human, which would be puerile ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana
... said Scribbo, "see the propriety of elevating these contemptible captives to share equal privileges with the native sons of Chaldea. Surely the king, in this, has betrayed ...
— The Young Captives - A Story of Judah and Babylon • Erasmus W. Jones
... which she wounded the sense of propriety in those about her was, that she would talk of some things that, in their judgment, ought to be kept secret. Now Barbara could understand keeping a great joy secret, but a misery was not a nice thing to ...
— There & Back • George MacDonald
... but with respect, 'it is permitted to all to make an application which the custom of the time has sanctioned. That is the extent of my action—at the highest. The propriety of granting such requests is another matter and rests with your lordship. I have nothing to do ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman
... is a very pearl of Church propriety. It is odd what different colours men show at different places. Down here, where he is well known, a great many even of the racing men fight shy of him. But I beg your pardon if he be a particular friend of ...
— Kept in the Dark • Anthony Trollope
... During much of the previous conversation our hero had been sorely perplexed in his mind as to his duty in present circumstances. Having been forbidden to hold any intercourse with Aileen, he questioned the propriety of his remaining to spend the evening with her, and had made up his mind to rise and tear himself away when this unlooked-for opportunity for a tete-a-tete occurred. Being a man of quick wit and strong will, he did not neglect it. ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... deplorable neglect of science is to be sought elsewhere. The fundamental difficulty is that which has been already indicated, that public taste and judgment deliberately prefers the type known as literary, or as it might with more propriety be designated, "vocal." In the schools there is no lack of science teaching, but the small percentage of boys whose minds develop early and whose general capacity for learning and aptitude for affairs ...
— Cambridge Essays on Education • Various
... especially if they should prove to be as considerable as I hope they may. But, my dearest love, I will tell you my reasons, and I hope you will approve them; for if I can excuse myself to you in a point in which your generous delicacy would be more likely to question the propriety of my conduct than in most others, I am sure my arguments will be convincing to those whose objections may arise from ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... just showed me how much more I wanted. I was pursued of course by letters from Mrs. Saltram which I didn't scruple not to read, though quite aware her embarrassments couldn't but be now of the gravest. I sacrificed to propriety by simply putting them away, and this is how, one day as my absence drew to an end, my eye, while I rummaged in my desk for another paper, was caught by a name on a leaf that had detached itself from the packet. The allusion was to Miss Anvoy, ...
— The Coxon Fund • Henry James
... the security of the State for an ineffectual defence of the fraternity. What I wish to observe is that if there were among the Jesuits men stained with guilt, and mischievous plotters, they ought to have been watched and punished as bad citizens; but it was incompatible with propriety or justice to condemn and punish a religious association, as such, in a place where the Pope held both his own seat and the supreme authority of the Church. None but the Pope had the power to condemn the society as a whole, and no condemnation ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne
... had adopted his suggestion with alacrity, without staying a moment to question its propriety; and both were up the tree almost as soon as ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... extempore pieces to their entertainments, it is reasonable to imagine, that the representation now described was intended as a satire against the girl, and to discourage others from following her steps. Such is the sense which they entertain of the propriety ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... rights of women by a constitutional amendment. Considering the many long days and weeks consumed in both houses in discussing the political rights of the colored male citizens, there is an obvious propriety in giving full and fair consideration to the protection of the rights of wives, mothers and daughters.—[The National ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... do nothing of the sort, Duke," said Lady Belgrade, hastily interposing. "You have left your lodgings for a wedding tour. You are not expected back there. Your people think that you are far from London with your bride. In the name of propriety, let them think so still. Do not go back there to-night, and wake them all up, and start a nine days' wonder of scandal. Stay where you are, Duke, quietly, until we recover our Salome. When we do, you can both leave for Paris. All the world ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... their hedge-rows cut in the most prim and undeviating lines around. The wayfarer rode on, through that part of the scene, with his eyes bent down in deep thought; but when he came to the wood; and, following the path—which, now kept with high neatness and propriety, wound in and out amongst the trees, and then sweeping gently round the shoulder of the hill, exposed a beautiful deer park—he had before his eyes a fine Elizabethan house, rising grey upon a little eminence at the distance of some four or five hundred yards,—it ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... her: him too, by contact. Money she might have had to any extent: upon application for it, of course. How was he to imagine that she wanted money! Smilingly as she welcomed him and his friends, entertaining them royally, he was bound to think she had means. A decent propriety bound him not to think of the matter at all. He naturally supposed she was capable of conducting her affairs. And—money! It soiled his memory: though the hour at Rovio was rather pretty, and the scene at Copsley ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... amazed at seeing a man who was subject to so strange an hallucination as that of believing himself to be made of glass, still retain such extraordinary judgment on other points as to be capable of answering difficult questions with the marvellous propriety and truth which distinguished ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... in fact, I concluded that if a colored man wanted to separate himself from his white neighbors, he had but to acquire some money, education, and culture, and to live in accordance. For example, the proudest and fairest lady in the South could with propriety—and it is what she would most likely do—go to the cabin of Aunt Mary, her cook, if Aunt Mary was sick, and minister to her comfort with her own hands; but if Mary's daughter, Eliza, a girl who used to run round my lady's kitchen, but who has received an education and married a prosperous ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... attention to the propriety of adopting the new code of international rules for the prevention of collisions on the high seas and of conforming the domestic legislation of the United States thereto, so that no confusion may arise ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Chester A. Arthur • Chester A. Arthur
... some others, agitated the propriety of refusing to accept the seven dollars per month offered them by the Government, and of refusing to do duty on account of it. Sergeant Barton, however, held it was better to serve without pay than to refuse ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... biographer) set a period to his labours, and deprived the world of further benefit from his talents, when he had only attained an age at which most other men are but beginning to be useful. "We see him in his cradle (said Fuseli); we hear him stammer; but propriety rocked the cradle, and character ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 10, Issue 273, September 15, 1827 • Various
... style to express yourself by fixing your thoughts on the subject you have to write about. Any one may mouth out a passage with a theatrical cadence, or get upon stilts to tell his thoughts; but to write or speak with propriety and simplicity is a more difficult task. Thus it is easy to affect a pompous style, to use a word twice as big as the thing you want to express: it is not so easy to pitch upon the very word that exactly fits it. Out of eight or ten words equally common, ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... and the linen, money, and plate stolen, the rabble of Caen having joined the expedition.—Here, and everywhere, there is nothing to do but to let this rabble have its own way; and as it operates against the possessions, the liberty; the life, and the sense of propriety of dangerous persons, the National Militia is careful not to interfere with it. Consequently, the orthodox, both priests and believers, men and women, are now at its mercy, and, thanks to the connivance of the armed force, which refuses to interpose, the rabble satisfy on ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... that he shrank from seeing her made one of the bishop's guests, but because he knew that she would practise her accustomed lures, and behave herself in a way that could not fail of being distasteful to the propriety of Englishwomen. These things had annoyed but not shocked him in Italy. There they had shocked no one; but here in Barchester, here among his fellow parsons, he was ashamed that they should be seen. Such had been his feelings, but he repressed them. What if his brother clergymen ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... crown helps us no more to see what Linnaeus saw in the one case than the fact that the papal miter is encircled by three crowns helps in the other. And as for the lofty, two-peaked cap worn by bishops in the Roman Church, a dozen plants, with equal propriety, might ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... import. Were this the case, and were the language now to be taught and understood in compliance with the original import of words, it would have to undergo a thorough change; to be analyzed, divided, and sub-divided, almost ad infinitum. Indeed, there is the same propriety in asserting that the Gothic, Danish, and Anglo-Saxon elements in our language, ought to be pronounced separately, to enable us to understand our vernacular tongue, that there is in contending, that their primitive meaning ...
— English Grammar in Familiar Lectures • Samuel Kirkham
... addressed to Tennyson the late Mr. Peter Bayne ventured to object to the dramatic propriety of Lady Clare speaking of herself as "a beggar born". Tennyson defended it by saying: "You make no allowance for the shock of the fall from being Lady Clare to finding herself the child of a nurse". But the expression is Miss Ferrier's: ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson
... to causes, it is probable, that the universe is generated or vegetated. At least after all the observations about a table, it may be modestly asked, whether there is not some difference between a table and the world? The Doctor will also find some difficulty in explaining the propriety of any argument of analogy between men and metals, which he does not at other times ...
— Answer to Dr. Priestley's Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever • Matthew Turner
... The persons who came on board were not cabin visitors; I am not even aware that they paid their respects to our excellent captain; but I feel compelled to add that, while on board, they behaved with the utmost propriety. I was located——" ...
— Freaks of Fortune - or, Half Round the World • Oliver Optic
... the length as a necessary reason; but for propriety, the scene wou'd very well have ...
— Every Man Out Of His Humour • Ben Jonson
... ibid., XII., 1856, page 390.) I confess I do not value Hopkins' opinion on such a point. I confess I have never thought, as you show ought to be done, on the future. I quite agree, under all circumstances, with the propriety of Lindley. How strange no new geologists are coming forward! Are there not lots of good young chemists and astronomers or physicists? Fitton is the only old geologist left who has done good work, except Sedgwick. Have you thought of him? He would be a brilliant companion for Lindley. Only it would ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... after the murder of these sons (self-provoked after all), dies a fugitive at Pisa, as it happens, by an odd accident, in the presence of Colomba, no violent death by Orso's own hand could have been more to her mind. In that last hard page of Merimee's story, mere dramatic propriety itself for a moment seems to plead for the forgiveness, which from Joseph and his brethren to the present day, as we know, has been as winning in story as in actual life. Such dramatic propriety, however, was by no means [27] in Merimee's way. ...
— Miscellaneous Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... by which empire and triumphs were to be won, as looking on human suffering with the sympathy of Howard, or as treating conquered enemies with the delicacy of the Black Prince, would be to violate all dramatic propriety. The old Romans had some great virtues, fortitude, temperance, veracity, spirit to resist oppression, respect for legitimate authority, fidelity in the observing of contracts, disinterestedness, ardent patriotism; but Christian ...
— Lays of Ancient Rome • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... were accompanied by one of my crew named Falaoa, who begged me to let him go with them, having become much attached to one of the young women. We gave them some arms and ammunition, and some clothing and tobacco. They all behaved with the greatest propriety during their stay on the ship. From where they started in Samoa to where we picked them up in 12 deg. S. is a distance of ...
— A Memory Of The Southern Seas - 1904 • Louis Becke
... that besides being a friend of our father, he was connected by the ties of blood with our family. Still, from the way our friend spoke, there appeared to be some mystery about him; but they did not offer to enlighten us, nor could we with propriety ask them, he also was evidently not inclined to be communicative ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston
... speak of excellence in dress we do not mean richness of clothing, nor manifested elaboration. Faultless propriety, perfect harmony, and a refined simplicity,—these are the ...
— The Laws of Etiquette • A Gentleman
... the man with American conceptions of ordered liberty. He was especially revolted by the bloodshed and cruelty, constantly gathering in strength, which were displayed by the revolutionists, and he had gone to the very verge of diplomatic propriety in advising the ministers of the king in regard to the policies to be pursued, and, as he foresaw what was coming, in urging the king himself to leave France. All his efforts and all his advice, like those of other intelligent men who kept their heads during the whirl of the ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... thousand Roman youths "—rather a broken reed to trust to (remembering what those young gallants were), with Caesar against him, now at the head of his legions just outside the gates of Rome. He himself seriously contemplated suicide, and consulted his friends as to the propriety of such a step in the gravest and most business-like manner; though, with our modern notions on the subject, such a consultation has more of the ludicrous than the sublime. The sensible and practical ...
— Cicero - Ancient Classics for English Readers • Rev. W. Lucas Collins
... command. Urmand has come here at my request, because I told him that you would be obedient. If you make a fool of me, and of yourself, and of us all, it will be impossible that I should forgive you. He will see you this evening, and I will trust to your good sense to receive him with propriety.' Then Michel Voss left the room and descended with ponderous steps, indicative of a ...
— The Golden Lion of Granpere • Anthony Trollope
... to return to her hotel. Such an unexpected turn to my communication routed all my plans, and after a very awkward silence of some minutes on both sides, I mumbled something about our expensive habits of life, costly equipage, number of horses, &c., and hinted at the propriety of retrenchment. ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... fibre of propriety and self-esteem. However, a worthy representative of the hospitality which prevailed in early days, he feigned to be talking very earnestly with D'Artagnan, and incessantly repeated:—"Ah! monsieur, what a happiness! what ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... awoke; stared wildly around him, and though a boy of genteel lineage, evinced a great distaste to mingling in society; and fought manfully to retain his position in the corner, when Harson attempted to lead him out. His sister endeavored, in an undertone, to impress upon him the propriety of adapting his manners to the change in his situation; but it must be confessed that her success was but indifferent; and it is a matter of some doubt whether he would ever have emerged, had not a tall, awkward boy, (a second cousin ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various
... inclined strongly to detest, he respected her. She had decision, and a worthy bearing, and a marvellously blooming aspect, and a brain that worked withal. When she spoke, desiring him to walk on by her side, he was pleased by her voice, and recognition of the laws of propriety, and thought it a thousand pities that she likewise should not become the wife of a gentleman. By degrees, after tentative beginnings, he put his spell upon her ears, for she was attentive, and walked with a demure forward look upon the pavement; in reality taking ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... climate upon the energies of a belle. Her parents arrived in New York, where she met them. She found letters there from her sister, Mrs. Robert Hazlehurst, to her mother and herself, strongly urging the propriety of Jane joining their party, for the last year of their European visit. Mrs. Hazlehurst thought travelling would be of great service to her sister, in every respect; it would, probably, restore her health entirety; in Paris she would take lessons from the best masters, ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... was dried and brown like a mummy's, and even when he spoke, his lips hardly stirred. He was in evening dress, his legs wrapped tightly in rugs; his chair was wheeled by a servant who was evidently perfectly trained in all the Trojan ways of propriety and decorum. ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... or three more recitals before the end of the season, have been much photographed and paragraphed, and then have gone into the country 'to spread her conquests farther'. This was Felix Dymes's hope. Writing with all propriety, he had yet allowed it to be seen how greatly he was vexed and disappointed at her failure to take the flood. Alma, too, had regretful moments; but she fought against the feeling with all her strength. Today she all but found courage to throw ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... mourning is that of the soul, and with me it will endure long beyond the time limited by society and the world in general. My heart is crushed with sorrow, and I can honor the memory of my father without conforming to customs of propriety. And believe me, my darling, a marriage contracted under the painful impressions caused by my sad loss, will appear more solemn and sacred than if ...
— A Cardinal Sin • Eugene Sue
... placing three chairs in a row, and bowing as if to the most distinguished visitors. Two or three men, who were lounging about the counter, looked on with a smile. Dotty was very well satisfied, for she enjoyed attention; but Prudy, who was older, and had a more delicate sense of propriety, blushed and cast down her eyes. She had thought nothing of driving a wheelbarrow through the street, but now, for the first time, a feeling of mortification came over her. If Mr. ...
— Dotty Dimple's Flyaway • Sophie May
... very restful. Each film is preceded on the screen by a certificate showing that its morality has been guaranteed by Mr. REDFORD. I have complete confidence in Mr. REDFORD'S sense of propriety. If, for instance, a bedroom scene is shown and a lady is about to change her gown, one's advance blushes are needless. That film will be arrested at the loosing of the first hook or button. Virtue will always be plainly triumphant and vice as plainly vanquished. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 18, 1914 • Various
... on sometimes as if there was no such thing as propriety at all, and such cases are said to be growing more frequent. Besides, Iris was not a girl who was conversant with social convenances. She looked at her pupil ...
— In Luck at Last • Walter Besant
... days after Adelaide had suggested to her brother the propriety of separating Elsie from her nurse, that he had the offer of a very fine estate in the immediate neighborhood of his ...
— Holidays at Roselands • Martha Finley
... society, as I met you in the home of our friend Mr Melmotte, I do not think that the gentleman is to be debarred from expressing his feelings because the lady may possibly have a parent. Your father, no doubt with propriety, had left you to be the guardian of yourself, and I cannot submit to be accused of improper conduct because, finding you in that condition, I availed myself ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... that of some of the older and most accredited writers, such as Cheyne, Cullen, and Rush. The testimony of certain living men and authors, particularly of our own country, has been presented toward the close of the chapter, and in a very brief and condensed form, from design. The propriety of inserting their names at all was for a time considered doubtful. It is believed, however, that they could not, in strict justice, have been entirely omitted. But let not the meagre sketch of their ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott
... Pleasure, had given Mankind quite contrary Laws, and commanded Rebellion, Murder, Ingratitude, and all Manner of Intemperance and Debauchery, instead of their opposite virtues; would the same Fitness, Beauty, and Propriety, appear to these Gentlemen, as there now does, in Virtue? If not, from whence the Difference arises, ...
— Free and Impartial Thoughts, on the Sovereignty of God, The Doctrines of Election, Reprobation, and Original Sin: Humbly Addressed To all who Believe and Profess those DOCTRINES. • Richard Finch
... between the nature of a scene and the craft or crafts representing it, but the assignment of the pageant in which God warns Noah to make an ark to the shipwrights, and of its successor, in which the patriarch appears in the Ark, to the "pessoners" and mariners has an obvious propriety, and must have conduced to the—not historical, but conventional—realism which was the aim of ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... management of their affairs." "But," he said in the same essay, "however inclined we might be to insist upon an unbounded complaisance in the executive to the inclinations of the people, we can with no propriety contend for a like complaisance to the humors of the legislature.... The executive should be in a situation to dare to act his own opinion with vigor and decision." It is frequently remarked that no President since Lincoln had so thorough a comprehension of public ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... paper lay near me, explainin the cause uv the catastrophe. The kind-hearted landlord, after feelin uv my pockets and diskiverin that the contents thereof wood not pay the arrearages uv board, held a hurried consultation with his wife as to the propriety uv bringin me to; he insisting that it wuz the only chance uv gittin what wuz back—she insistin that ef I was brung to I'd go on runnin up the bill, bigger and bigger, and never pay at last. While ...
— "Swingin Round the Cirkle." • Petroleum V. Nasby
... handsomer; and every day grew fonder and fonder of playing with his little cousins. Upon some pretence or other, he contrived to be constantly in the room with them when Fanny was there: the modest propriety of her manners, however, kept him at that distance at which it was no easy matter for a pretty girl, in her situation, to keep such a gallant gentleman. His intention, when he came to Mrs. Hungerford's, was to stay but a week; but when that week was at an end, ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... any note agree that the law Similia similibus is the only fundamental principle in medicine. Of course if any man does not agree to this the name Homoeopathist can no longer be applied to him with propriety. ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... charmed with the spirit and propriety of Perdita's behaviour; and perceiving that the young prince was too deeply in love to give up his mistress at the command of his royal father, he thought of a way to befriend the lovers, and at the same time to execute a favourite scheme he ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... called Gaspe Point, six or seven miles below the city, where the offending craft had run aground the previous evening in giving chase to the Newport-Providence packet-boat, and after a spirited fight mastered the Gaspe's company, put them on shore, and burned the ship. There would be much propriety in dating the Revolution ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... rooms nearly to suffocation. Eloise had more than once changed her mind about going, as she sat waiting for Jack. She was shy with strangers, and there would be so many there, and she would be so conspicuous in her chair, with Mr. Harcourt in attendance, that she began to doubt the propriety of going. ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... an unconscious propriety in the way in which, in all European languages, the word person is commonly used to denote a human being. The real meaning of persona is a mask, such as actors were accustomed to wear on the ancient stage; and it is quite true that no one shows himself as he is, but wears his ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Studies in Pessimism • Arthur Schopenhauer
... propriety of sending men into what was then Stonewall Jackson's territory, but he gave Mosby a letter to Jackson, recommending the bearer highly and outlining what he proposed doing, with the request that he ...
— Rebel Raider • H. Beam Piper
... not an ordinary being. To uncommon talents, and a mind of most refined order, she united great feminine propriety, and a total absence of those arts which sometimes characterise those to whom the accident of birth has given importance. With unerring discrimination, she drew the exact line between vivacity and satire, true religion and ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... interference from the Governor with their affairs. On the eve of the election of the Speaker, they received a message from Mr. Bennett and the Council advising them not to choose a certain Lieutenant-Colonel Chiles. Although it was clearly shown that this gentleman could not serve with propriety, the Burgesses gave him the election, merely, it would seem, as a rebuke to the ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... State, Mr. Knott, having, by appointment, at one of the county seats in "the Purchase," made the opening speech, was seated near by to listen to that of the opposing candidate. The latter, a gentleman having a high sense of propriety, and a dignity of bearing that would have done no discredit to an assembly of divines, had been exceedingly annoyed by Knott's speech, which had in very truth kept the audience in an uproar during its entire delivery. ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... cheerful, as devoted in misfortune as they had been in prosperity. On the left of the surintendant sat Madame de Belliere; on his right was Madame Fouquet; as if braving the laws of the world, and putting all vulgar reasons of propriety to silence, the two protecting angels of this man united to offer, at the moment of the crisis, the support of their twined arms. Madame de Belliere was pale, trembling, and full of respectful attentions for madame la surintendante, who, with one hand on her husband's, was looking anxiously ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... before the mind which needs, to some extent, translation into terms no longer musical—terms, for instance, of skill, dramatic passion, or moral sentiment. But in music pre-eminently, and very largely in all the arts, external propriety is adventitious; so much can the mere presence and weight of a symbol fill the mind and constitute an ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... chiefly cultivated at this period was rhetoric, which appears to have differed considerably from what now passes under the same name. The object of it was not so much justness of sentiment and propriety of expression, as the art of declaiming, or speaking copiously upon any subject. It is mentioned by Varro as the reverse of logic; and they are distinguished from each other by a simile, that the former resembles the palm ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... accommodation as he could have wished. Elated by his recent successes, he now aspired not only to the possession of Cuzco, but of Lima itself, as falling within the limits of his jurisdiction. It was in vain that Espinosa urged the propriety, by every argument which prudence could suggest, of moderating his demands. His claims upon Cuzco, at least, were not to be shaken, and he declared himself ready to peril his life in maintaining them. The licentiate ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... came very near realizing my idea perfectly; but I see that Science just has as little effect as Culture in driving the Old Adam out of us! The idea of the only simpleton in the lot having to lecture the others on propriety of deportment! I thought they were going to tear each other's eyes out! Ha! Ha! Ha! It's impayable! Give me that cord, Michael! Hand me the heavy ruler, Ardan! It's the only way to bring him to reason! Ho! Ho! Ho! It's too good! ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne
... Clemence, "in praising much the sweetness of your disposition and the exemplary propriety of your conduct, Madame Armand complains of your want of ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... tea parties the utmost propriety and dignity of deportment prevailed. No flirting nor coquetting; 15 no gambling of old ladies nor hoyden chattering and romping of young ones; no self-satisfied struttings of wealthy gentlemen with their brains in their pockets nor amusing conceits and monkey divertisements of smart young gentlemen ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... moralizing and reflection. It was, as we have said, the fault of his age. But no one, who is familiar with Seneca, will severely censure Tacitus. He will only wonder that he should have risen so far above the faults of his contemporaries. Indeed, Tacitus interweaves his reflections with so much propriety, and clothes his apothegms with so much dignity—he is so manifestly competent to instruct the world by maxims, whether in civil, social, or individual life, that we are far from wishing he had indulged in it less. His reflections do not interrupt ...
— Germania and Agricola • Caius Cornelius Tacitus
... there had been spectators in that assembly." As recently as within these last two centuries, indeed, both in the development of the career of Moliere and in the writing of his biography by Voltaire, the whole question as to the propriety of a great author becoming the public interpreter of his own imaginings has been, not only discussed, but defined with precision and in the end authoritatively proclaimed. Voltaire, in truth, has significantly remarked, in his "Vie de Moliere," when referring ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent
... inseparable from the Author's character. In the Editor's wish, however, to preserve this originality, he cannot flatter himself that incorrect expressions may not sometimes have been left. In regard to the Greek inscriptions, he thinks it necessary only to remark, that although the propriety of furnishing the reader with fac-similes of all such interesting relicts of ancient history cannot in general be doubted, yet in the present instance, the trouble and expense which it would have occasioned, would hardly have been compensated by the importance ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... thought, and suddenly a daring idea came into her mind. All her life long her mother's relations had been brought up to her as the pink of propriety, the souls of wealth. Her uncle, George Hartrick, was, according to her mother, a wealthy man. Her mother had often described him. She had said that he had been very angry with her for marrying the Squire, but had confessed that at times he had been ...
— Light O' The Morning • L. T. Meade
... England, and, to the astonishment of every one, Budreenath Sing and his fellow conspirators are only banished for life. It is said that the minister resisted all the representations of his friends as to the propriety of executing the conspirators, by the argument of "What would the 'Times' say?"—which must have appeared to the majority of the members of the Nepaul Durbar to be a very extraordinary reason ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant
... indebted for their fame. Of faction, because .(Hiatus in MS.). Of poetry, because its orators do perorare with a song; and because, climbing up by slow degrees, fate is sure to turn them off before they can reach within many steps of the top; and because it is a preferment attained by transferring of propriety and a confounding of ...
— A Tale of a Tub • Jonathan Swift
... tell the simple truth, Diploma, if you please. Tell Mrs. Weight that I do not desire to see her. She should know better than to call at this house to-day on any pretence whatever. My dear sister would have been highly incensed at such a breach of propriety. I—" the fire faded, and the little figure drooped, wavered, rested for a moment on the arm of the faithful servant. "I thank you, my good Diploma. I will go and lie down now, as ...
— Mrs. Tree • Laura E. Richards
... before our view, Dark'ning the air that should be sunny, Here's Oscar,[8] growing dismal too, Our Oscar, who was once so funny! Blue china ceases to delight The dear curl'd darling of society, Changed are his breeches, once so bright, For foreign breaches of propriety! ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III., July 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... sallies of passion are so artfully interwoven with the principal subject, that upon a review of the whole piece, we find it to be a perfect imitation of Nature. This Poet (whose judgment appears to have been equal to his imagination) is particularly careful to observe propriety in his most irregular excursions, and the vivacity of his passion is justified by the circumstances in which he is supposed to be placed. The diction of these poems is likewise adapted with great accuracy to the sentiment, as it is generally concise, forcible, and expressive. ...
— An Essay on the Lyric Poetry of the Ancients • John Ogilvie
... to me. But there was Mills, who apparently believed in your existence. I could trust Mills. My doubts were about the propriety. I couldn't see any good reason for being taken to see you. Strange that it should be my connection with the sea which brought me ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... submitted to the consideration of your High Mightinesses, together with the propriety of appointing some person, or persons, to treat on the ...
— A Collection of State-Papers, Relative to the First Acknowledgment of the Sovereignty of the United States of America • John Adams
... of pompous or solemn individuals seems to arise from the same (more or less unconscious) working of the mind as that caused by some unexpected neglect of those social "taboos" or laws of behaviour which we call modesty, decency, and propriety. They either cause indignation and resentment in the onlooker at the neglect of respect for the taboo, or, on the contrary, the natural man, long oppressed by pomposity or by the fetters of propriety imposed by society, suddenly feels a joyous sense of escape from his bonds, and bursts into ...
— More Science From an Easy Chair • Sir E. Ray (Edwin Ray) Lankester
... from me the knowledge of my actual condition. My first panic was succeeded by the perturbations of surprise to find myself alone in the open air and immersed in so deep a gloom. I slowly recollected the incidents of the afternoon, and how I came hither. I could not estimate the time, but saw the propriety of returning with speed to the house. My faculties were still too confused, and the darkness too intense, to allow me immediately to find my way up the steep. I sat down, therefore, to recover myself, and to reflect ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... and his coming, like a thunderstorm, was heard from far: while I, unlettered and unfashioned, should, if I came in contact with him, in the judgment of his courtly followers, bear evidence in my very person to the propriety of that ingratitude which had made me the degraded being ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... the harbour, and by pushing aside one branch we look down upon a heavy-sterned fishing-boat, the straw-gold mats of the deck-house pushed back to show the perfect order and propriety of the housekeeping that is going forward. The father-fisher, sitting frog-fashion, is poking at a tiny box full of charcoal, and the light, white ash is blown back into the face of a largish Japanese ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling
... as dolls and nincompoops, no more discrimination between one sex and the other as to knowledge of this world's wickedness, no more curtailment of personal liberty on the score of that bugaboo, propriety—all these, if you like, ladies; but we men, we fathers and philosophers, ask that you retain, for our sakes, beauty of face and form, beauty of raiment, low, modulated voices, and a graceful carriage, faith, hope, and charity, even though you continue to ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... vulgar gloss their faults; xix. 9, says a gentleman alters thrice; xix. 10, says a gentleman will not lay on burdens before he is trusted; xix. 11, says if we keep within the bounds of honour, we may ignore propriety; xix. 12, says, Should a gentleman's training bewilder him?; xix. 13, says a scholar with his spare ...
— The Sayings Of Confucius • Confucius
... as we mingle in the society of our fellow-men, is the distinction between agreeable people and disagreeable. There are various tests, more or less important, which put all mankind to right and left. A familiar division is into rich and poor. Thomas Paine, with great vehemence, denied the propriety of that classification, and declared that the only true and essential classification of mankind is into male and female. I have read a story whose author maintained, that, to his mind, by far the most interesting ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... Miss Ramsay never excused the morning walk on the dusty highroads. The children came in very much flushed and tired at one o'clock for dinner. They assembled again in the big, cool dining room and ate their roast mutton and peas and new potatoes, and rice pudding and stewed fruit with the propriety of children who have ...
— A Little Mother to the Others • L. T. Meade
... a huge success and made the kind of sensation in which Frohman delighted. There was much question as to its propriety, so much so that the Lord Chamberlain himself, who supervised the censorship, came and witnessed the performance. He made ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... laws of the land, or the precepts of morality. A man guilty of breaking these, though he cannot be transported for a felon, or indicted for treasonable practices, is yet, in the High Court of Custom, branded as a flagrant offender against decorum, as notorious for an unprecedented infringement on propriety. ...
— Parodies of Ballad Criticism (1711-1787) • William Wagstaffe
... siege of six months. Various other difficulties occurred between Judea and Rome, previous to the Saviour's advent, on account of which she was greatly depressed and humbled, so that it might with propriety be said that one-third of her stars were cast to the ground. This depression was one great reason why the church within her borders looked so earnestly for ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... of kinship within which marriage is prohibited is, with one exception, quite in accordance with modern sentiment, the exception being the disallowal of marriage with the sister of a deceased wife, the propriety of which is greatly disputed and need not be discussed here. The marriage of a brother and sister would excite a feeling of loathing among us that seems implanted by nature, but which, further inquiry will show, has mainly arisen from tradition ...
— The World's Greatest Books - Volume 15 - Science • Various
... the Confederation, and when I shall have the pleasure of seeing you I may perhaps give you the Causes why that important Matter was not determind sooner. I immediately after reading your last mentiond Letter communicated to the Council that part of it which relates to the Propriety & Necessity of making regular Returns of what is done here in Consequence of the Recommendations of Congress; and a Committee of that Board is now looking over the Journals & Papers for that Purpose. In the same Letter you mention your having receivd a Letter from Mr John Amory, with ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... bringing him even with the rear line of the flying group. And yet so little was the pace to him that he fairly gambolled in playfulness as he went slashing along, until the deacon verily began to fear that the honest old chap would break through all the bounds of propriety and send his heels antically through his treasured dashboard. Indeed, the spectacle that the huge horse presented was so magnificent, his action so free, spirited, and playful, as he came sweeping onward, that cheers and ...
— The Busted Ex-Texan and Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... will allow madame to cover herself and arrange only to show you sufficient to convince you," said the lover, knowing that the lady had a mark or two easy to recognise. "Turn your back a moment, so that my dear lady may satisfy propriety." ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... there may be with regard to the propriety of cooking the food of stock, we believe there ought not to be a doubt as to the desirability of mechanically treating the harder kinds of feeding stuff. It is quite evident that a horse fed upon hard grains of oats and wiry ...
— The Stock-Feeder's Manual - the chemistry of food in relation to the breeding and - feeding of live stock • Charles Alexander Cameron
... presume many of you are aware that I deem it unnecessary as well as unwise, on occasions of this kind, for a minister to dwell at length upon the life and character of the deceased, for, as I have before said, our duty is with the living; but upon the present occasion, I think I may with propriety say, that we see before us the lifeless remains of one who has 'died in the Lord.' I have been for many years acquainted with our aged sister now departed, and have ever regarded her as an humble and earnest christian. I have frequently visited her during her lengthened period of ...
— The Path of Duty, and Other Stories • H. S. Caswell
... philosophies are, to pure metaphysical speculations, but connects these with scientific observations and social practice. Bruno having resuscitated these doctrines, stamps them with a wider scope, giving them a more positive direction; and he may with propriety be called the second Pythagoras. The primal idea of Pythagoras, which Bruno worked out to a more distinct development is this: numbers are the beginning of things; in other words numbers are the cause of the existence of ...
— The Heroic Enthusiasts,(1 of 2) (Gli Eroici Furori) - An Ethical Poem • Giordano Bruno
... complete and consummate his unnatural conduct toward his father, persuaded the beautiful Judith, his father's widow, to become his wife, in violation not only of all laws human and divine, but also of those universal instincts of propriety which no lapse of time and no changes of condition can eradicate from the human soul. This second union throws some light on the question of Judith's action. Since she was willing to marry her husband's son to preserve the position of a queen, ...
— King Alfred of England - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... tall, slim, young lady, black merino, by no means new, clean cuffs and collar leaning against the chair for support, and yet sacrificing herself to conventional propriety, and even withstanding him with a pretty little air of defiance that was pitiable, her pallor and the ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... and man was most probably elevated above the beast by the faculty of reason in this respect as in others. Promiscuous indulgence is always evidence of debauchery, and a departure from that natural course which is prompted by an innate sense of propriety characterizing mankind. The law is very indefinite with regard to what constitutes a legal marriage. It is an unsettled question, both in England and this country, whether a marriage solemnized by customary formalities alone is legal, or if one characterized ...
— The Ladies Book of Useful Information - Compiled from many sources • Anonymous
... scholar, he was, as became the grandson of the founder of "The Derby," even better as a sportsman; and in private life he was the best companion in the world, playful and reckless, as a schoolboy, and never letting prudence or propriety stand between him and his jest. "Oh, Johnny, what fun we shall have!" was his characteristic greeting to Lord John Russell, when that ancient rival ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... to walk down into the parlor," repeated Mrs. Darlington, whose sense of propriety was outraged by the man's conduct, and who felt a corresponding degree ...
— Godey's Lady's Book, Vol. 42, January, 1851 • Various
... tending sheep should be as fit and proper for women as for men. The pastoral life, so favourable to love and the enjoyment of nature, has ever been a favourite theme of the poet. Here it appears to be the antidote of all poetry and propriety, only because man's better half is wanting. Under this unfavourable aspect the white man first comes before the aboriginal native; were the intruders accompanied by women and children, they could not be half so unwelcome. One of ...
— Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia • Thomas Mitchell
... of his life the teacher of a congregation, and no reader of his works can doubt his fidelity or diligence. In the pulpit, though his low stature, which very little exceeded five feet, graced him with no advantages of appearance, yet the gravity and propriety of his utterance made his discourses very efficacious. I once mentioned the reputation which Mr. Foster had gained by his proper delivery to my friend Dr. Hawkesworth, who told me, that in the art of pronunciation he was far inferior to ...
— The Psalms of David - Imitated in the Language of The New Testament - And Applied to The Christian State and Worship • Isaac Watts
... I was scheduled to give a series of lectures at the University of Chicago on The Outdoor Literature of America, and with a delightful feeling of propriety in the fact I set to work to write these addresses in my canvas lodge, surrounded by all its primitive furnishings. It made an admirable study, but at night as I lay on my willow couch, I found the moonlight so intense and the converging lines of the lodge poles so suggestive ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... same day, while it was still early morning, Honore Grandissime, f.m.c., with more than even his wonted slowness of step and propriety of rich attire, had reappeared in the shop of the rue Royale. He did not need to say he desired another private interview. Frowenfeld ushered him silently and at once into his rear room, offered him a chair (which he accepted), and sat down ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... Commission) again demanded the charter, the danger was past: conditions in England had become so serious for the King that the complaints against Massachusetts were lost to view. At last in 1639 Gorges obtained his charter for a feudal propriety in Maine but no further attempts were made to overthrow the ...
— The Fathers of New England - A Chronicle of the Puritan Commonwealths • Charles M. Andrews
... participation in the feelings of the agent, and by following out with fine psychological observation this sympathy of men into its first and last manifestations. In this way a twofold kind of morality was revealed to him: mere propriety of behavior and real merit in action. On the one hand, that is, the sympathy of the spectator—as Hume has one-sidedly emphasized—is directed to the utility of the consequences (or to the "merit") of the ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg
... don't get daughter-struck," I said perkily, turning to flee, for it had suddenly dawned upon me that my thin wet clothing was outlining my figure rather too clearly for propriety. ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... out of patience; and if we did not give utterance aloud to our thoughts, I shrewdly suspect if those thoughts had formed themselves into words, those words would have sounded very much like, "Nonsensical sentimentality!" "strange infatuation!" but nothing could be said with propriety, and the engagement was fully entered into. Some time had necessarily to elapse before its fulfillment, however, for the lover was but twenty; but it was well understood, that when he had finished his studies, and was settled in his profession, he was ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various
... as ever the young artist did to her. Of course, there was an exchange of prettinesses, and life on either side became a blank when she was immured at Brompton, and the only solace left was the notes that so outrage your and Bobbie's united sense of propriety.' ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... of this last post-office rouses his righteous indignation, and he calls for justice upon a wrong-doer. "There is no question of the propriety of removing the postmaster at Carlinville, I have been told by so many different persons as to preclude all doubt of its truth, that he boldly refused to deliver from his office during the canvass all documents franked by Whig members ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... sad news by letter to her lover in London, and pressed him to come immediately to Henley; but the gallant officer replied that he was confined to the house for fear of the bailiffs, and suggested the propriety of a remittance from the mistress of his heart. Mary promptly borrowed forty pounds from Mrs. Mounteney, fifteen of which she forwarded for the enlargement of the captain, who, on regaining his freedom, came to Henley, where he remained some weeks. ...
— Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead
... shall sit down with his friend at the foot of the Great Pyramid and they will take up the question they had been talking about under "the great elm," and forget all about Egypt. When I was crossing the Po, we were all fighting about the propriety of one fellow's telling another that his argument was absurd; one maintaining it to be a perfectly admissible logical term, as proved by the phrase "reductio ad absurdum;" the rest badgering him as a conversational ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... Taking counsel together, and thinking how lovely it would be now if Mr. Folsom would only see how much there was in this unmarried damsel, or that widowed dame, the coterie at Emory again returned to the subject, until John, in his perplexity, got the idea that propriety demanded that he should have a housekeeper against his daughter's coming, and then he did go and do, in his masculine stupidity, just exactly what they couldn't have had him do for worlds—invite a woman, of whom none of their number had ever heard, to come ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King
... be just as well that he should not be disrespectful to the captain. Now Jack had not, hitherto, put on his uniform, and he thought this a fitting occasion, particularly as the waiter suggested the propriety of his appearance in it. Whether it was from a presentiment of what he was to suffer, Jack was not at all pleased, as most lads are, with the change in his dress. It appeared to him that he was sacrificing his independence; however, he did not follow his ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... difficulty in breathing. The evil consequences of this attempt at the graceful were but temporary, however; and the next morning, as I sat up quite recovered, a discussion took place between mamma and the old nurse on the propriety of equipping me at once in corsets to improve my figure. I soon experienced the delight of possessing a pair of my own; on which memorable occasion, I resolved that, like the old woman, I would "neither ...
— A Grandmother's Recollections • Ella Rodman
... is, as it were, to suffer death, with the precarious chance of resuscitation. Wherefore the Goddess, in the wisdom of her Divinity, hath been accustomed to select as persons to whom the secrets of her religion can with propriety be entrusted, those who, standing as it were on the utmost limit of the course of life they have completed, may through her Providence be in a manner born again, and commence the career ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... fourteenth year, owned two horses, and employed another boy to sell papers for him likewise. His profits upon daily sales of four hundred journals were about thirty-two dollars. He had five hundred dollars in bank, and was debating with Captain Kingwalt the propriety of founding an army express and general agency. Such a self-reliant, swaggering, far-sighted, and impertinent boy I never knew. He was a favorite with the Captain's black-boy, and upon thorough terms of equality ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... words were said with a propriety and collectedness that even, through all her terrors, showed at once to Sarah how much they now wronged Fanny who had suffered their lips to repeat the ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 5 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... etiquette to ask to "feel", and who, by their superior culture and breeding, know all about your movements, while you know very little or nothing about theirs. In a word, to comport oneself with perfect propriety in Polygonal society, one ought to be a Polygon oneself. Such at least is the painful teaching ...
— Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (Illustrated) • Edwin A. Abbott
... peasant; "when we were ignorant men, and possessed no property of our own except these staffs in our hands, we were destitute of all manly motives for propriety of conduct; but you have taught us to read out of the Holy Book, how to serve God and honor the king. And shall we not respect laws which thus bestow on us, and ensure to us, the fruits of our labors ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... son, or a sister her brother, or a wife her husband, if she so desires, without any question as to the propriety of it. A man should not, on the other hand, introduce another man to his wife, or a son or brother make a presentation of a man to his mother or sister, unless he knows that such acquaintance could not but be agreeable ...
— The Etiquette of To-day • Edith B. Ordway
... Fourth of July, two printer's apprentice-lads, nearly grown, dressed in jackets and very tight pantaloons of check, tight as their skins, so that they looked like harlequins or circus-clowns, yet appeared to think themselves in perfect propriety, with a very calm and quiet assurance of the admiration of the town. A common fellow, a carpenter, who, on the strength of political partisanship, asked B——'s assistance in cutting out great letters from play-bills ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... going forward to the parlour, I beheld females learning to dance and to sing, and to play on instruments, for the purpose of making their lovers seven times more foolish than they were already: on going to the buttery, I found them taking lessons in delicacy and propriety of eating: on going to the cellar, I saw them making up potent love drinks, from nail-parings and the like: on going to the chambers, we beheld a fellow in a secret apartment, putting himself into all kinds of attitudes, to teach his beloved elegant manners; another ...
— The Sleeping Bard - or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell • Ellis Wynne
... certain recreations very common in society, and which he was in the habit of joining, though freely questioning the propriety of so doing, said, "O, I don't care much for those things. I could easily give them up, but people think you are so queer if you decline, and you feel as if you were a back number." Ah! there was the rub. The desire to be thought ...
— Quiet Talks on Power • S.D. Gordon
... Skipper Evans in the latter part of the last century. Solemnly baptized and consecrated to some holy saint, it had called to prayer the veiled sisters of a convent, and tolled heavily in the masses for the dead. At first some of the church felt misgivings as to the propriety of hanging a Popish bell in a Puritan steeple-house; but their objections were overruled by the minister, who wisely maintained that if Moses could use the borrowed jewels and ornaments of the Egyptians to adorn and beautify the ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... wrong to delay your journey half a dozen days for the purpose of hunting men who would have cut your throats for a sixpence. Throw aside all such ideas of propriety, and remember that you are in a country where the struggle for gold engrosses all other passions; men will look upon you as fools, to reject that which you are entitled to. Go with me to Melbourne. Help escort these villains ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes |
