"Usurper" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Constans had decided this easy but important revolution, the example of the court of Autun was imitated by the provinces of the West. The authority of Magnentius was acknowledged through the whole extent of the two great praefectures of Gaul and Italy; and the usurper prepared, by every act of oppression, to collect a treasure, which might discharge the obligation of an immense donative, and supply the expenses of a civil war. The martial countries of Illyricum, from the Danube to the extremity of Greece, had long obeyed the government of Vetranio, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... if, like the Castle of Otranto, there was something in Mordaunt Court which contained a penalty and a doom for the usurper, no sooner had Vavasour possessed himself of his kinsman's estate, than the prosperity of his life dried and withered away, like Jonah's gourd, in a single night. His son, at the age of thirteen, fell from a scaffold, on which the workmen were ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the number of soldiers Malcolm would probably need he gave orders for double that number to march into Scotland. Malcolm with this support attacked Macbeth, and after several well-fought battles drove the usurper from Scotland and took possession ...
— Famous Men of the Middle Ages • John H. Haaren
... theory which supposed an infallible guidance of the Holy Spirit to attend as a matter of course on that position. Some of the boldest of them did not hesitate to declare that the Holy City had suffered a foul invasion, and that a false usurper reigned in her sacred palaces in place of the Father of Christendom. The greater part did as people now do with the mysteries and discrepancies of a faith which on the whole they revere: they turned ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various
... rights is presumed to have abandoned them; a presumption which is at best doubtful, and cannot destroy the right and established property of a monarch. Besides, even this presumption altogether vanishes when the superior strength of a usurper has prevented the lawful proprietor from claiming his rights, which has been the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... by the Shinto sanctions for a national life. They thus discovered the defect of the disjointed feudal system sanctioned by feudal Confucianism. The second cause of its undoing grew out of the first. The scholarship which led the patriots against the usurper in political life led them also against all foreign innovations such as Buddhism and Confucianism, which they scorned as modern and anti-imperial. The Shinto cultus thus received a powerful revival. With the overthrow of the Shogunate in 1868 Confucianism ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick
... Voltaire censures his kings as not completely royal. Dennis is offended, that Menenius, a senator of Rome, should play the buffoon; and Voltaire perhaps thinks decency violated when the Danish Usurper is represented as a drunkard. But Shakespeare always makes nature predominate over accident; and if he preserves the essential character, is not very careful of distinctions superinduced and adventitious. His story requires Romans or kings, but he thinks only on men. He knew that Rome, ...
— Preface to Shakespeare • Samuel Johnson
... of the ancient ancient nobility of France, an emigrant with Artois, a warrior with Conde, an exile during the reign of the Corsican usurper, a grand prince, a great nobleman afterwards, though shorn of nineteen-twentieths of his wealth by the Revolution,—when the Duke d'Ivry lost his two sons, and his son's son likewise died, as if fate had determined to ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... standpoint the pure and sacred striving after light and truth, to say the least, would seem quixotic and criminal if it should venture in its feeling of justice to denounce the authoritative belief as a usurper who has taken possession of the throne of truth and maintained it by continuing ...
— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer
... character of the man. He was liberated upon giving bail, but had no sooner reflected on this liberation than he came to the conclusion that it was wrong, by offering security, to recognize the authority of magistrates appointed by a usurper, as he held William to be, and voluntarily surrendered himself to his judges. Of course he was again committed, but this time to the King's Bench, and would doubtless in a few years have made the tour of the London prisons, if his enemies had not been tired of trying ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... dungeon of Castel S. Angelo, while Franco placed himself on the chair of S. Peter, under the name of Boniface VII. The legal Pope was soon after strangled. Such crimes startled for a moment the apathy of the Romans, who besieged and stormed the castle, deposed the usurper, and named in his place Benedict VII., whose grave we are now visiting in S. Croce in Gerusalemme. Yet Crescenzio and Franco did not pay dearly for their crimes. Franco, after plundering the Vatican basilica of its valuables, migrated to Constantinople, ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani
... me, order one expert marksman, if he had such a thing in his whole army, to shoot me through the heart, that I would show you, Dupre, how a man dies under such circumstances, but the villain refused. The usurper has no soul for art, or anything else, for that matter. I hope you won't mind my death. I assure you I don't mind it myself. I would much rather be shot than live in this confounded country any longer. But I have made up my mind to cheat old Balmeceda if I can, and I want you, Dupre, ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... writers have hastily concluded, that, in the fifteenth century, the English Parliament was altogether servile, because it recognised, without opposition, every successful usurper. That it was not servile its conduct on many occasions of inferior importance is sufficient to prove. But surely it was not strange that the majority of the nobles, and of the deputies chosen by the commons, should approve of revolutions which the nobles ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... sainted martyr Charles on the scaffold, ''T is no concern of the common people's how they are governed.' A common man equal to a Talbot! Fight, my son, if you must; but oh, fight for the king, even an usurper, before a republic, a mob in which so-called equality stands in very unstable equilibrium,—fight for the rightful ruler of the land, not ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... flames of discontent, and making great promises to those who would restore Rhodolph to the throne. Intolerant and odious as Rhodolph had been, his great reverses excited sympathy, and many were disposed to regard Matthias but as a usurper. Thus influenced, Matthias not only signed all the conditions, but was also constrained to carry them, into immediate execution. These conditions being fulfilled, the nobles met on the 19th of November, ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... coins was one of Carausius (our English Carew), with two heads on it symbolling the ambition of our native usurper to assert empire over East as well as West, and among more treasure-trove was a unique gold coin of Veric,—the Bericus of Tacitus; as also the rare contents of a subterranean potter's oven, preserved to our day, and yielding several whole vases. Mr. Akerman of numismatic fame told me that ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... myself, keep thy throne in my heart. If the usurper LOVE once more drive thee from it, thou ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... woman as the usurper of my property. Her husband as well as herself, were laborious and covetous; their good fortune had made no change in their mode of living, but they were as frugal and as eager to accumulate as ever. In their hands, money was inert and sterile, or it served to foster their vices. To take it ...
— Memoirs of Carwin the Biloquist - (A Fragment) • Charles Brockden Brown
... driving the usurper off the commons. Later, she consoled Alfred with the statement that Bent Wilgus had gum in his shoes that made him bounce so. "His daddy keeps a shoe store an' thet's where he gits bouncin' shoes from. I'll git ye a pair ef I hev to ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field
... crown and without a kingdom. She had come all the way from Brazil to take her grandfather's throne, a little present from her father, Dom Pedro I., the rightful heir, but only to find the place filled by a wicked uncle, Don Miguel. She had a long fight with the usurper, her father coming over to help her, and finally ousted Miguel and got into that big, uneasy arm-chair, called a throne, where she continued to sit, though much shaken and heaved up and about by political convulsions, for ...
— Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood • Grace Greenwood
... manifested open hostility and presented a bold and united front instantly upon the firing of the first gun upon Fort Sumter, so would it be in all the States of the Northwestern league; they would at once rise, when knowing that their brethren of Chicago were in arms against the "usurper and his hirelings;" but these hasty counsels did not prevail, and individuals were exhorted to take care of themselves if drafted, but on no account to go ...
— The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details • I. Windslow Ayer
... incompetent son, Ferdinand, and to place Joseph Bonaparte on the throne. But the master of Europe underestimated the fighting ability of Spaniards. Instead of humbly complying with his mandate, they rose in arms against the usurper and created a central junta, or revolutionary committee, to govern in the name of Ferdinand ...
— The Hispanic Nations of the New World - Volume 50 in The Chronicles Of America Series • William R. Shepherd
... himself, is an usurper. The rightful heir is a boy of seven or eight years old, and I think it is possible that, either at the present man's death, or possibly even before that, he may ascend the throne. At present, ...
— At the Point of the Bayonet - A Tale of the Mahratta War • G. A. Henty
... pay no price for the good-will of such a son-in-law as Seleucus. He reinforced these cities with sufficient garrisons to enable them to make a defense against Seleucus; and, receiving information that Lachares, taking the opportunity of their civil dissensions, had set up himself as an usurper over the Athenians, he imagined that if he made a sudden attempt upon the city, he might now without difficulty get possession of it. He crossed the sea in safety, with a large fleet; but, passing along the coast of Attica, was met by a violent ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... the Indian newspapers, or from any friends you may have connected with this part of the world, than from me. But, as far as I can learn, this appears to be it: Shah Shooja is the rightful heir to the throne of Cabool, and Dost Mahomed is what Mr. C. Dickens calls the "wrongful one," alias the usurper. Dost Mahomed had possession of the country, and the Indian government, from what motives I know not, determined to unseat him and replace Shah Shooja. In this matter they are assisted by old Runjet ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... Charles II. seized the public fund collected for the relief of the Vaudois, and refused to remit the annuity arising from the interest thereon which Cromwell had assigned to them, declaring that he would not pay the debts of a usurper! ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles
... eldest child Elizabeth a prisoner within these massive walls. The unfortunate Edward, Earl of Warwick, the eldest son of George, Duke of Clarence, when only eight years old, was also incarcerated here for about three years. Richard III, the usurper, when he lost his only son, had thought of making this boy his heir, but the unfortunate child was passed over in favour of John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, and remained in close confinement at Sheriff Hutton until August, 1485, when the Battle of Bosworth placed ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home
... came to the throne with the title of Henry IV. Soon, however, he found himself menaced by danger. Some of the lords who had been stripped of the honours and wealth heaped upon them by Richard entered into a conspiracy to assassinate Henry the usurper. During the Christmas holidays they met frequently at the lodgings of the Abbot of Westminster to plan the king's destruction. After much deliberation they agreed to hold a splendid tournament at Oxford on the 3rd of January, 1400. Henry ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... of Marcus Ordeyne At the Gate of Samaria A Study in Shadows Where Love Is Derelicts The Demagogue and Lady Phayre The Beloved Vagabond The White Dove The Usurper Septimus Idols ...
— George Bernard Shaw • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... by force thrust from his thrones And an Usurper subt'ly mount thereon; I've seen a state unmoulded, rent in twain, But ye may live to see't made up again. I've seen it plunder'd, taxt and soaked in blood, But out of evill you may see much good. What are my thoughts, ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... am wronging Mr Spriggins in assuming that he thought the usurper of his rights worthy of a glance at all: and certainly I am anticipating my story. John dined with the old lady; drank her currant wine in preference to her port, ate her seed biscuits, and when Mr Mogg, in pursuance of a message from ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... He became a martyr to his devotion to the 'time-honored custom;' for alas! good old Irish whisky is as certainly among the 'things that were,' as are the Irish kings. Some have shrewdly thought that it was the only real Irish king. Well, then, it is owing to this cousin's loyalty to the usurper, or rather pretender, that I am the family chronicler. He was wonderfully ingenious; could from the slightest hint guess at the whole story; he was equal to those naturalists who from one bone can make out the animal. With the remains of an old family tradition for his clue, he traced ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... away from the mistress's room. He wanted to see the downfall of the Prince, whom he had always hated, looking upon him as a usurper of his own rights upon the fortune of the Desvarennes. He began lamenting to his aunt, when she turned upon him with unusual harshness, and he felt bound as he said, laughing, to leave ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... afterward created him Caesar, and having given him his own sister Helen in marriage, he sent him to Gaul against the barbarians. For the barbarians whom the Emperor Constantius had hired as auxiliary forces against Magnentius, being of no use against that usurper, were pillaging the Roman cities. Inasmuch as he was young he ordered him to undertake nothing without consulting the other military chiefs.{HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS} Julian's complaint to the Emperor of the inertness ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... greater conveniences to the Romantic than to the Classical practitioner. With minor variations, the story as generally dramatised is this. Merope, the widowed queen of the murdered Heraclid Cresphontes, has saved her youngest son from the murderer and usurper, Polyphontes, and sent him out of the country. When he has grown up, and has secretly returned to Messenia to take vengeance, Polyphontes is pressing Merope to let bygones be bygones and marry him, so as to reconcile the jarring parties in the State. AEpytus, the ...
— Matthew Arnold • George Saintsbury
... same fate; as was the case of Tiptoft earl of Worcester, who had fled and was taken in disguise. Trials had never been used with any degree of strictness, as at present; and though Richard was pursued and killed as an usurper, the Solomon that succeeded him, was not a jot-less a tyrant. Henry the Eighth was still less of a temper to give greater latitude to the laws. In fact, little ceremony or judicial proceeding was observed ...
— Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third • Horace Walpole
... that I thought more could be seen with the successful side, and that the indications pointed to the defeat of the French. My choice evidently pleased him greatly, as he had the utmost contempt for Louis Napoleon, and had always denounced him as a usurper and a charlatan. Before we separated, the President gave me the following letter to the representatives of our Government abroad, and with it I not only had no trouble in obtaining permission to go with the Germans, but was specially favored by being invited to accompany the headquarters ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. II., Part 6 • P. H. Sheridan
... and despised, his arms were ever open. They had his tenderest sympathies. They had his warmest love. His heart's blood he poured out upon the ground for the human family, reduced to the deepest degradation, and exposed to the heaviest inflictions, as the slaves of the grand usurper. And yet, according to our ecclesiastics, that class of sufferers who had been reduced immeasurably below every other shape and form of degradation and distress; who had been most rudely thrust out of the family of Adam, and forced ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... published in 1832, the interest circles round the machinations of an elusive, ubiquitous "Masque," eventually revealed to be none other than the son of the late Landgrave, who, like many a man before him in the tale of terror, has been done to death by a usurper. Disappearances through trap-doors, and escapes down subterranean passages are effected with a dexterity suggestive of Mrs. Radcliffe's methods; and the inexplicable murders, with the exception of that of an aged seneschal accidentally betrayed, are ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... of the Greenland or right-whale, he is the best existing authority. But Scoresby knew nothing and says nothing of the great sperm whale, compared with which the Greenland whale is almost unworthy mentioning. And here be it said, that the Greenland whale is an usurper upon the throne of the seas. He is not even by any means the largest of the whales. Yet, owing to the long priority of his claims, and the profound ignorance which, till some seventy years back, invested the then fabulous or utterly unknown sperm-whale, and which ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... disappeared, so men think, and I the King still rule as of old in my kingdom. Not the slightest suspicion as to the true state of things has ever entered the brain of anyone in the nation, and so the usurper is absolutely safe in the ...
— Chinese Folk-Lore Tales • J. Macgowan
... fallen into the hands of the usurper, he sent his spies in every direction for the purpose of getting possession of Jemshid wherever he might be found, but their labor was not crowned with success. The unfortunate wanderer, after experiencing numberless misfortunes, at ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... that France was divided into provinces (or dukedoms as they were called) there reigned in one of these provinces an usurper, who had deposed and banished his elder brother, the ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... Italy had out-measured the worldly supremacy of the Vatican in the modern parallelogram of forces, that had certainly been a fault of judgment rather than of intention. He had never wavered in his fidelity to his ideal, nor had he ever voluntarily submitted to any law imposed by the 'usurper.' ...
— The White Sister • F. Marion Crawford
... the greatness of the dead monarch, bursts forth in eloquent praise of this so-called "usurper" of other days. He was not only an Emperor and a King, but the legitimate sovereign of his country. No ordinary sepulture is to be his—it is to be an august sepulture, a silent sacred spot which those who respect glory, genius, and greatness may visit in "reverential ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... are not satisfied with berating him; they also conspire against him. What means shall they take to overthrow the power of this unlawful ruler?—for in the eyes of the housekeeper he is a usurper, and in those of Berta's father, a tyrant;—turn him out of the house? This is the one thought of the conspirators. But how? This is the ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Spanish • Various
... these terms, in a tone as decided as if he still occupied his episcopal throne, and as if the usurper kneeled a suppliant at his feet, the tyrant slowly raised himself in his chair, the amazement with which he was at first filled giving way gradually to rage, until, as the Bishop ceased, he looked ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... way, or setting a house on fire, is real power. To this Polus assents, on the ground that such acts would be punished, but he is still of opinion that evil-doers, if they are unpunished, may be happy enough. He instances Archelaus, son of Perdiccas, the usurper of Macedonia. Does not Socrates think him happy?—Socrates would like to know more about him; he cannot pronounce even the great king to be happy, unless he knows his mental and moral condition. Polus explains that Archelaus was a slave, being the son of a woman who was the slave ...
— Gorgias • Plato
... they were doubled, and did weigh me down Prostrate to the earth, methinks I could rise up Erect, with nothing but the honest pride Of telling thee, usurper, to thy teeth, Thou art a monster! Think upon my chains? How came they ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... transferring the honours and burdens of supreme power to their infant children; and the rise of the Tycoons, long the temporal sovereigns of the country, is traced to the abdication of a certain Mikado in favour of his three-year-old son. The sovereignty having been wrested by a usurper from the infant prince, the cause of the Mikado was championed by Yoritomo, a man of spirit and conduct, who overthrew the usurper and restored to the Mikado the shadow, while he retained for himself the substance, of power. He bequeathed to his ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... the people of England, subsidized, in effect, a horde of ruthless assassins and robbers, with a view to striking terror to the hearts of the natives, and driving them into a recognition of the right of the usurper to rule over them, and dispose as he saw fit of their property and persons. This right, however, was never conceded in even the most remote degree; for, notwithstanding that the colony of foreign spears and battle-axes ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh
... the colored race generally. Does a colored man by hard labor and patient industry, acquire a good location, a fine farm, and comfortable dwelling, he is almost sure to be looked upon by the white man, as an usurper of his rights and territory; a robber of what he himself should possess, and too often does wrong the colored man out of,—yet, I am happy to acknowledge ...
— Twenty-Two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman • Austin Steward
... Oliver's army invaded Scotland, and the independent chaplains in that army thought their own dispensation was above that of Geneva. Upon this, such of the presbyterians as would recommend themselves to the Usurper, and such as had his ear, forbore those forms in the public worship, and by degrees they ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... Rodney, but there's something very nice about it. Great pity, though, that they are French, and so corroded, so crusted over, as I may call it, with a sort of hero-worship for that tyrannical usurper. There, I won't mention ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... intended for my ear alone, "this is a brave and gallant thing you do, and however slight may be your hope of prevailing, yet your honour will be safe-guarded by this act, and men will remember you with respect should it come to pass that a usurper shall possess anon your throne. Bear you that in mind to lend you a glad courage. I shall pray for you, my ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... old Country! I have watched thee long Still ever first to rise against the wrong; To check the usurper in his giant stride, And brave his terrors and abase his pride; Foresee the insidious danger ere it rise, And warn the heedless and inform the wise; Scorning the lure, the bribe, the selfish game, Which, through the office, still becomes the shame; Thou stood'st aloof—superior to the fate ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... indignant at it. The high Philippist party sneers at and despises it; the Republicans hate it: it seems a joke against THEM. Why continue it?—If there be anything sacred in the name and idea of loyalty, why renew this fete? It only shows how a rightful monarch was hurled from his throne, and a dexterous usurper stole his precious diadem. If there be anything noble in the memory of a day, when citizens, unused to war, rose against practised veterans, and, armed with the strength of their cause, overthrew them, why speak of it now? or renew the bitter recollections ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... with all his skill; the lips a bright carmine, the eyes a deep, deep cobalt, the cheeks a dazzling vermilion, the ringlets of a golden hue; and he worships this sweet creature of his in secret, fancies a history for her; a castle to storm, a tyrant usurper who keeps her imprisoned, and a prince in black ringlets and a spangled cloak, who scales the tower, who slays the tyrant, and then kneels gracefully at the princess's feet, and says, "Lady, wilt ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was Udalric of Manderscheit, he whom the Chapter had appointed. But when Udalric was summoned before the Council of Bale, he was declared an usurper; and the fathers did what it was by no means their unvarying rule to do,—they confirmed ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... said in a low, bleak voice. "Has he, this precious royal master of yours, this usurper—has he parted with that thing; the ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... of the cranes. Garstin missed the warmth of the fire and shivered; he had forgotten his overcoat; and he experienced only the mildest curiosity in the surroundings. Trevannion walked rapidly and in silence. He was thinking mainly of how he could get his own back from this usurper. ...
— Adventures in Many Lands • Various
... of witches, who inflicted torments upon an image made in his name, for the sake of compassing his death. In the tale of Macbeth, which is another early instance of Demonology in Scottish history, the weird-sisters, who were the original prophetesses, appeared to the usurper in a dream, and are described as volae, or sibyls, rather than as witches, though Shakspeare has stamped the latter character ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... foreign parts he found that his favourite corner-seat had been annexed by another Member. Determined to reclaim it, he visited the House at 8 A.M. and inserted his card; but on coming back to the House for prayers found that the usurper had substituted her own. Mr. T.P. O'CONNOR, with old-world chivalry, considered that the only lady-Member should be allowed to sit where she pleased; but the SPEAKER upheld the principle ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 158, April 21, 1920 • Various
... father, invited all soldiers of King George, by offers of increased rank or increased pay, to desert to the Stuart colors, promised a free pardon and full religious liberty to all who should renounce their allegiance to the usurper, and threatened all who, after due warning, remained obdurate with grave pains and penalties. Everywhere through the west this document had been seen and studied, had inflamed men's minds, and set men's pulses dancing to old Jacobite tunes. In Edinburgh, in Berwick, in Carlisle, ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... supreme deity,' 'the rivalry between the Creator and the divine Sun.' In China, as we shall see, Mr. Tylor thinks, on the other hand, that Heaven is the elder god, and that Shang-ti, the Supreme Being, is the usurper. ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang
... Would you? In my country a usurper is upon the throne, kept there, held there, like a child who would fall but for its nurse's arms, by all the Powers of Europe. It is I who should be there. It is I who will be there one day. Shall I tell you? There are hundreds, thousands, of ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... worked a great change in Scotland. On Henry's death, David, as the uncle of the Empress Matilda, immediately took up arms on her behalf. Stephen, with the wisdom which characterized the beginning of his reign, came to terms with him at Durham. David did not personally acknowledge the usurper, but his son, Henry, did him homage for Huntingdon and some possessions in the north (1136). In the following year, David claimed Northumberland for Henry as the representative of Siward, and, on Stephen's refusal, again adopted the cause of the empress. The usual ...
— An Outline of the Relations between England and Scotland (500-1707) • Robert S. Rait
... with my sad and labourious career; and my indignation well nigh overmastered reason. The mad impulse stirred me to force the doors, to rush into the grand salon, and drive out the intruder,—the son of Madame Gerdy,—who had taken the place of the son of the Countess de Commarin! Out, usurper, out of this. I am master here. The propriety of legal means at once recurred to my distracted mind, however, and restrained me. Once more I stood before the habitation of my fathers. How I love its ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... prove, by taking the liberty of making two objections; and they are only to the last page but one. Perhaps you will think that my first objection does show that I am too much biassed. I own I am sorry to see my father compared to Sylla. The latter was a sanguinary usurper, a monster; the former, the mildest, most forgiving, best-natured of men, and a legal minister. Nor, I fear, will the only light in which you compare them, Stand The test. Sylla resigned his power voluntarily, insolently: perhaps timidly. as he might think he had a better chance of dying in his bed, ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... and gazed at this old fortress of his fathers, with the standard of the foreign invader floating above its top-mast tower. He said nothing; yet, I could tell by the heaving of his chest, what thoughts were passing in his mind, what hatred of the usurper, what impatience to stand once more on those battlements and fling open the gate ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... chandelier. Even Lady Fitz-pompey said 'Brava!' As she proceeded the audience grew quite frantic. It was agreed on all hands that miracles had recommenced. Each air was sung only to call forth fresh exclamations of 'Miracolo!' and encores were as unmerciful as an usurper. ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... honours were obtained By him a brother's murder stained; 'Tis true, the purchase nearly drained His ill-got treasure, soon replaced. Would'st question whence? Survey the waste, And ask the squalid peasant how 740 His gains repay his broiling brow!— Why me the stern Usurper spared, Why thus with me his palace spared, I know not. Shame—regret—remorse— And little fear from infant's force— Besides, adoption as a son By him whom Heaven accorded none, Or some unknown cabal, ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... felt that he could not look forward to many years—perhaps not even to many months—of life. In this difficulty, he felt no shame in appropriating to himself a royal tomb recently constructed by a king, named Siphthah, whom he looked upon as a usurper, and therefore as unworthy of consideration. In this sepulchre we see the names of Siphthah and his queen, Taouris, erased by the chisel from their cartouches, and the name of Set-nekht substituted in their place. By one and the same act the king punished an unworthy predecessor, and provided ...
— Ancient Egypt • George Rawlinson
... Independent of my enthusiasm as a Scotsman, I have rarely met with anything in history which interests my feelings as a man, equal with the story of Bannockburn. On the one hand, a cruel, but able usurper, leading on the finest army in Europe to extinguish the last spark of freedom among a greatly-daring and greatly-injured people; on the other hand, the desperate relics of a gallant nation, devoting themselves to rescue their bleeding ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... the sports of his youth with a sort of melancholy pleasure, yet under the influence of the strong fatality which hurried him to his end. It is by mixing somewhat of this feeling in the character of Macbeth, that Shakspeare has excited a momentary interest even for a murderer and usurper, who perceives "his life fallen into the sere and yellow leaf," and pauses for a moment in melancholy reflection as he rushes to "die with harness ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes
... etiquette, and granted prayers that no respectable god would ever consent to hear. When Pombo heard this he took two handfuls of the arch-idolater's beard and kissed them joyfully, and dried his tears and became his old impertinent self again. And he that carved from jasper the usurper of Wosh explained how in the village of World's End, at the furthest end of Last Street, there is a hole that you take to be a well, close by the garden wall, but that if you lower yourself by your hands over the edge of the hole, ...
— The Book of Wonder • Edward J. M. D. Plunkett, Lord Dunsany
... Ishmael, you say, is a usurper, yet to believe an Idumaean sooner than Ishmael is to sting like an adder. By the drunken son of Semele, what it is to be a Jew! All men and things, even heaven and earth, change; but a Jew never. To him there ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... him by comparison. Language has been tortured to find epithets sufficiently strong to paint him in description. Imagination has been exhausted in her efforts to deck him with revolting and inhuman attributes. Tyrant, despot, usurper; destroyer of the liberties of his country; rash, ignorant, imbecile; endangering the public peace with all foreign nations; destroying domestic prosperity at home; ruining all industry, all commerce, all manufactures; annihilating confidence between man and man; delivering up the streets of populous ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... have flourished and will flourish for a season, for truth, when she cannot be heard by the opposition of falsehood, remains silent and leaves time to decide the difference, who cometh quietly and impartially to her assistance, hurling without ceremony, century after century, usurper after usurper from the throne of the mighty, and erasing their names from his altar as suddenly and as perfectly as the sunbeam passes over and washes away the stains of a shadow on the wall. Fame hath weighed the false criticisms and pretensions of centuries already, and found nothing as ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... of France, had been driven into exile, and his crown usurped, by Torismond, his younger brother. To amuse the people, and keep them from thinking of the banished King, the usurper appointed a day of wrestling and tournament; when a Norman, of great strength and stature, who had wrestled down as many as undertook with him, was to stand against all comers. Saladyne went to the Norman secretly, and engaged him with rich rewards ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... civil, that the people of Scotland do no longer owe him allegiance; and although I stand up for governments and governors, such as God's Word and our covenants allow, I will surely—with all who choose to join me— disown Charles Stuart as a tyrant and a usurper." ...
— Hunted and Harried • R.M. Ballantyne
... Her style is eminently graceful, and the turn of thought such as we would expect from the most accomplished and fascinating woman of her times. The narrative is neither very copious nor very regular; but all that is told is of the deepest interest. It abounds in domestic anecdotes of the great usurper, and reports conversations between him and his wife, in which, by the way, her speeches rival, in prolixity, those given us by Livy. Many of her views of Bonaparte and herself are novel and striking, and calculated, if relied upon, to change opinions now generally ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... usurping king, fled on the approach of King Tecla and Ras Michael with 20,000 men. On their entry into the city, those who had sympathised with the usurper were executed in hundreds with a wanton cruelty which shocked and disgusted me. The bodies of the victims were cut in pieces and scattered about the streets, and hundreds of hyenas came down from the neighbouring mountains to feed on ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... On both sides the knights fought with the utmost courage, and when nearly all were slain, Arthur encountered the traitor Mordred. Summoning all his strength, the exhausted king finally slew the usurper, who, in dying, dealt Arthur a mortal blow. This would never have occurred, however, had not Morgana the fay, Arthur's sister, purloined his magic scabbard and substituted another. All the enemy's host had perished, and of Arthur's noble army only one man remained ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... valley north of the Yukon as his, who warned off hunting parties of Indians who ventured upon it, and made them give up game killed in "his territory." They came to the mission and complained about it, but they never withstood the usurper. It ought to be added that it always appeared more as the making good of a practical joke than as a serious pretension, but the ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... the modern idea of a tyrant with that of an usurper. The latter is a sense in which Britain was said to be fertile in tyrants, viz. In ...
— On The Ruin of Britain (De Excidio Britanniae) • Gildas
... reads as pleasantly as any story in "Astree," no mean compliment. Probability, geography and chronology, are not Lodge's strong points; we are in fact again in the country of nowhere, in an imaginary kingdom of France over which the usurper Torismond reigns. The true king has been deposed and leads a forester's life, untroubled, unknown, in the thick woods of Arden. Rosalind, a daughter of the deposed king, has been kept as a sort of hostage at the court of the tyrant in Bordeaux, presumably his capital. ...
— The English Novel in the Time of Shakespeare • J. J. Jusserand
... we believe that a simpler democratic system, with fewer checks and balances, would be an improvement on our present Constitution. The framers of that Constitution had two apprehensions constantly before their minds—one, that of a military usurper overthrowing popular freedom; the other, that of an insurrectionary populace overthrowing law and government. Experience has shown that neither of these dangers could be realized in a country and with ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... palliations, still it would seem a mockery of all moral distinctions not to condemn in him what we would condemn in another, or what Cromwell himself condemned in the murdered king. It is true he did not, at once, turn usurper, not until circumstances seemed to warrant the usurpation—the utter impossibility of governing England, except by exercising the rights and privileges of an absolute monarch. On the principles of expediency, ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... game, in which the English were specially active. From their shores, well-equipped and plentifully supplied with money, sailed many who were desirous of gaining the great stake,—obdurate Chouans and fanatical royalists who regarded as an act of piety the crime that would rid France of the usurper. What gave most cause for alarm in these reports, usually unworthy of much attention, was the fact that all of them were agreed on one point—Georges Cadoudal had disappeared. Since this man, formidable by reason of his courage and tenacity of purpose, had declared war without mercy ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... died.[4] He was succeeded by Taimur Shah, who was succeeded by his eldest son, Zaman Shah, who, after a reign of a few years, was driven from his throne by his younger brother, Mahmud. He sought an asylum with his friend Ashik, who commanded a distant fortress, and who betrayed him to the usurper, and put him into confinement. He concealed the great diamond in a crevice in the wall of the room in which he was confined; and the rest of his jewels in a hole made in the ground with his dagger. As soon as Mahmud received intimation of the arrest from Ashik, he ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... They remained stupefied, stranded, as it were, in the midst of a torrent which deafened them by its roaring, but might not move them by its violence. The clergyman, who could not hitherto have ejected the usurper of his pulpit otherwise than by bodily force, now addressed her in the tone of just ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... had been content with the perquisites of the smaller offices, were now made drunken by the insecurity of Bakahenzie's position. Each of the doctors, seeing a chance to prove his superior merit and win Bakahenzie's post as chief doctor, had busily made magic to destroy the usurper, and each and every one provided a different reason for the failure thereof. Every day came news of the doings of the white god with eyes upon his hands, of shootings and floggings, of the burning of the village including the idol, the temple, and the sacred tombs of MFunya MPopo, ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... France, the battle and peace of Waterloo having ended the purpose for which he had been appointed by Louis XVIII., through the orders of the Marchal Duc de Feltre, minister at war, to raise recruits from the faithful who wished to quit the usurper. ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... side of the centralizing Emperor appeared a usurper of the most peculiar kind; his vicar and son-in-law, Ezzelino da Romano. He stands as the representative of no system of government or administration, for all his activity was wasted in struggles for supremacy in the eastern part of Upper Italy; but as a political type he was a ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... extended farther than fatherly correction. She would have found it impossible to accomplish his ruin, had not her efforts been reinforced by a new auxiliary, who was no other than his uncle, the present usurper of his title and estate; yet even this confederacy was overawed, in some measure, by the fear of alarming the unfortunate mother, until her distemper increased to a most deplorable degree of the dead palsy, and the death of her father had reduced ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... evil to the cause of freedom in the Netherlands. The spirit of liberty seemed to have been typified in the fair form of the benignant and unhappy Jacqueline, and to be buried in her grave. The usurper, who had crushed her out of existence, now strode forward to trample upon all the laws and privileges of the provinces ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... since the Emperor knew that they were faithful to him and his friends, he took from their number more than twenty thousand warriors to serve against the tyrant Eugenius who had slain Gratian and seized Gaul. After winning the victory over this usurper, he ...
— The Origin and Deeds of the Goths • Jordanes
... of the Coup d'Etat is well known; for the Republican's side, read Hugo's own "History of a Crime." Hugo, proscribed, betook himself to Brussels, London, and the Channel Islands, waiting to "return with right when the usurper ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... been brought in such close contact at St. Germains would little bear the inspection of a stern moralist. So he gave his allegiance where he could not give his esteem, and learned to respect sincerely the upright and moral character of one whom he yet regarded as an usurper. King William's government had little need to fear such a one. So he returned, as I have said, with a sobered heart and impoverished fortunes, to his ancestral house, which had fallen sadly to ruin while ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... the summer the caravan started and crossed the Apennines to set sail at Ostia. The date of this exodus has never been made quite clear. Perhaps Augustin and his companions fled before the hordes of the usurper Maximus, who, towards the end of August, crossed the Alps and marched on Milan, while the young Valentinian with all his Court took refuge at Aquileia. In any case, it was a trying journey, especially in the hot weather. When Monnica arrived she was very enfeebled. At Ostia they had to wait ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... usurper Mirza, however, was great in proportion. They marched in force to the palace and took the old magician and his son prisoners. The Caliph sent the magician to the room where the Princess had lived as an owl, and there had him hanged. As the son, however, knew nothing of his father's acts, the ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various
... Philippe, son of France, take your place on that bed; Philippe, sole king of France, resume the blazonry that is yours! Philippe, sole heir presumptive to Louis XIII., your father, show yourself without pity or mercy for the usurper who, at this moment, has not even to suffer the agony of the remorse of all that you have ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... the Bandit was an ill-used and most estimable man. He had some mysterious rights to the Estate and Castle of the Remorseless Baron. That titled usurper, therefore, did all in his power to hunt the Bandit out in his fastnesses and bring him to a bloody end. Here the interest centred itself in the Bandit's child, who, we need not say, was the little girl in the wreath and spangles, ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... answer. I presume it is because I married so young. I was married at twenty-three, and did not begin to write until I was twenty-nine. Most of my lullabies are, in a sense, love-songs; so is 'To a Usurper,' 'A Valentine,' 'The Little Bit of a Woman,' 'Lovers' Lane,' etc., but not the kind commonly called love-songs. I am sending you herewith my first love-song, and even into it has crept a cadence that makes it a love-song of maturity rather than of youth. I do not ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... concealed me; but unhappily the Colonel Benbows were both made prisoners, and Colonel Thomas Benbow with the Earl of Derby and several other gallant noblemen. To my grief, I heard soon afterwards that Colonel Thomas Benbow was shot with the Earl and several others, for engaging in what the usurper pleased to call rebellion; but of my friend Colonel John Benbow I could for a long time hear nothing, and had myself to ...
— Roger Willoughby - A Story of the Times of Benbow • William H. G. Kingston
... anyone. And you have no right to call Captain Winstanley a usurper. You have no reason to take your mother's marriage so much to heart. There is nothing sinful, or even radically objectionable in a second marriage; though I admit that, to my mind, a woman is worthier in remaining faithful to her first love; like Anna the prophetess, who had been a widow ...
— Vixen, Volume II. • M. E. Braddon
... "possession." To dislodge its garrison, however, more vigorous measures were called for; and desperate though they continued to grow, the Boers had no bayonets, without which it was hardly possible for them to achieve their purpose. Long Tom at Kamfers Dam was too far off to communicate with the proud usurper; it had perforce to content itself with the city streets, into which the shells kept falling for some hours in the forenoon—until positively the last of the missiles ended its blaze with a groan at eleven o'clock! That the bombardment ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... however, were all frusrtrated in the event. Rhe'a Sil'via, and, according to tradition, Mars the god of war, were the parents of two boys, who were no sooner born, than devoted by the usurper to destruction. 7. The mother was condemned to be buried alive, the usual punishment for vestals who had violated their vows, and the twins were ordered to be flung into the river Tiber. 8. It happened, however, at the time this rigorous sentence was ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... feeble nephew who would take very little to poison him, was much afraid of the Spanish-born old King Ferdinand and the Crown Prince Alfonso of Naples, who, not liking cruelty and treachery which were useless to themselves, objected to the poisoning of a near relative for the advantage of a Lombard usurper; the royalties of Naples again were afraid of their suzerain, Pope Alexander Borgia; all three were anxiously watching Florence, lest with its midway territory it should determine the game by underhand backing; and all four, with every small ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... Herod. The proud metropolis had not yet heard the news. The immortal honor of having given birth to the Christ had been denied to her haughty brow and had become humble Bethlehem's imperishable crown. The very name of king gave Herod a terrible shock. He was a usurper steeped in crime and was ever trembling on his throne. No hunted, white-faced, Russian Czar ever feared nihilist's bomb more than he feared rebellion's revolt and assassin's knife. Rebel after rebel he had crushed into spattered brains and blood, and here was rumor of another ...
— A Wonderful Night; An Interpretation Of Christmas • James H. Snowden
... to a distant city, where none recognized in the sable clad widow, the former brilliant belle and heiress. I once visited my old home and saw them together; and he, the false one, smiled fondly upon the usurper of my rights. Then I crept away, weary of life, to this secluded spot, to pass the remainder of my days, where there was nothing to remind me of ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... and Jesus Christ be a kind of Chieftain, set up against Antichrist; his Method of Recovery must be as extensive as the Fall—Why does he save some? but as they are Objects of Mercy, and to recover, with a just Indignation, Souls, originally God's own, out of the Hand of an Usurper, Tyrant, and Destroyer. How can these Reasons operate as to a Part, and have no Influence as to the Remainder? The more I reflect upon the Doctrine, and view it in every light, the more terrifying and deformed it appears: and there is no Argument, short of God's ...
— 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
... number—are admitted by the historian to have been in existence seventy years after the imputed massacre?14 Why was the massacre, instead of being limited to the legitimate members of the royal stock, who could show a better title to the crown than the usurper, extended to all, however remotely, or in whatever way, connected with the race? Why were aged women and young maidens involved in the proscription, and why were they subjected to such refined and superfluous tortures, when it is obvious that beings so impotent could have ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... cannot stand out against us," argued Balmerino. "The Duke of Newcastle is almost an imbecile. The Dutch usurper himself is over in Hanover courting a new mistress. His troops are all engaged in foreign war. There are not ten thousand soldiers on the island. At this very moment the King of France is sending fifteen thousand across in transports. He will have no difficulty in landing them ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... perhaps less pretentious, employment than that of either soldiering or sailoring; that they would toil—with their hands, if need be—until they should accumulate a sufficient sum to return and recover the ancestral estate from the grasp of the avaricious usurper. They did not know how it was to be done; but, young, strong, and hopeful, they believed it might be done,—with time, patience, and industry to ...
— Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No. 1 - An Illustrated Magazine • Various
... about disowning the king's authority, he answered like a true Protestant and a heroic patriot—"I own all authority that hath its prescriptives and limitations from the word of God; but I cannot own this usurper as lawful king—seeing both by the word of God, such a one is incapable to bear rule, and likewise by the ancient laws of the kingdom, which admit none to the crown of Scotland until he swear to defend the Protestant religion, which a man of his ...
— The Life of James Renwick • Thomas Houston
... who reigned in England since the death of the usurper, Cromwell, was a grandson of Henri IV., just as much as our King. Charles II. displayed the pronounced penchant of Henri IV. for the ladies and for pleasure; but he had neither his energy, nor his genial temper, nor his amiable frankness. After ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... reducing them everywhere to the defensive, and forced Louis to do violence at once to his strongest prejudices and his most reasonable political wishes, by recognizing as king of England him whom he looked upon as a usurper as well as his own inveterate enemy. On its surface, and taken as a whole, this war will appear almost wholly a land struggle, extending from the Spanish Netherlands down the line of the Rhine, to Savoy ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... they should both be banished, which presently was done, the tyrant rather choosing to hazard the loss of his only child than anyways to put in question the state of his kingdom; so suspicious and fearful is the conscience of an usurper. Well, although his lords persuaded him to retain his own daughter, yet his resolution might not be reversed, but both of them must away from the court without either more company or delay. In he went with great melancholy, and left these two ladies alone. Rosalynde waxed very ...
— Rosalynde - or, Euphues' Golden Legacy • Thomas Lodge
... term as governor amidst vituperation and obloquy. He was known as the "Usurper," and in order to reduce him to a mere figurehead, the Federalists who controlled the Assembly, led by Josiah Ogden Hoffman, the brilliant New York lawyer, now proposed to choose a new Council of Appointment, although the term of the old Council had ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... winner in a long war of varying fortunes. He was, in addition, what very few great soldiers or commanders have ever been, a great constitutional statesman, able to lead a people along the paths of free government without undertaking himself to play the part of the strong man, the usurper, or the ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... of ten years, the new Khan forgot the merits and the strength of his benefactor—the base usurper, as he deemed him, of the sacred rights of the house of Genghis. Through the gates of Derbent he entered Persia at the head of ninety thousand horse: with the innumerable forces of Kiptchak, Bulgaria, Circassia, and Russia, he passed the Sihun, burned the palaces of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... Irish crew in order. Oh what a magnificent wreck is man! I do love to watch the rapid approach of that glorious time when, the six thousand years of his degradation beneath the reign of Satan being fulfilled, he shall rise above the usurper's power, and resume his high station among the ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... he may be supposed to have found his way north to the camp of Siward, where the youthful and exiled Scotch Prince had sought shelter from Macbeth, and it is no undue stretch of fancy to suggest that he took his part in the memorable overthrow of that usurper at Dunsinane, and thus obtained the favour of his successor. The growth of the Gordon family in place and power was rapid. To the lands on the borders was soon added the Huntly country on Deeside, where Aboyne Castle now stands, ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... Shelley's mind to the end, and made him rebellious against everything bearing the paternal name. He assailed the Father of the Hebrew theocracy with amazing bitterness, and joined Prometheus in cursing and dethroning Zeus, the Olympian usurper. With him, tyrant and father were synonymous, and he has drawn the old Cenci, in the play of that name, with the same fierce, unfilial pencil, dipped in blood and wormwood. Shelley was by nature, self-instruction, and inexperience of life, impatient and full of impulse; and the sharp and violent ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... and were prepared for the wiles of the usurper. Know then, that, through the agency and good offices of that renowned princess, Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy, the king's escape from the Tower was accomplished; but not by might, nor by human power ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... that has been stirred up by this rising has cooled down somewhat, milder measures will be used, and some mercy be shown; but it may be long, for the Hanoverian has been badly frightened, and the Whigs throughout the country greatly scared, and this for the second time. I am no lover of the usurper, but I cannot agree with all that has been said about the severity of the punishment that has been dealt out. I have been fighting all over Europe, and I know of no country where a heavy reckoning would not have ...
— With Frederick the Great - A Story of the Seven Years' War • G. A. Henty |
