"Frankincense" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... have ever been a passion with me. I love their aromatic odors, reminding one of balm and frankincense, and the great Temple of Solomon itself, built of fine cedar-wood. I admire their stately symmetry, and the majesty of their unchanging presence, and stand well pleased and ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... dee break, an der shadders goo away, I'll git me to de mountain of myrrh, and to de hill of frankincense. ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... immortal gods Accept the meanest altars, that are raised By pure devotion; and sometimes prefer An ounce of frankincense, honey, or milk, Before whole hecatombs, or Sabaean gems, ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... 'pestilential distempers,' and be a powerful defence 'against the morbid effluvias of the corpse.' For the same reason, this writer asserts, it was customary to burn rosemary in the chambers of the sick, just like frankincense, 'whose odour is not much different from rosemary, which gave the Greeks occasion to call it Libanotis, from ...
— Storyology - Essays in Folk-Lore, Sea-Lore, and Plant-Lore • Benjamin Taylor
... recognition depends the reputation of the artist, his verses as well as his drawings were a sealed, or at least an enigmatical, book. His verses have no literary atmosphere about them: they smell neither of the midnight oil nor of that smoke of fame the fumes of which Byron tells us "are frankincense to human thought." They seem to have been written as spontaneously as a bird might warble on a bough, and no bird was ever more careless of auditors than Blake. It was not until twelve years after his death that a selection from his poems was given to the general public by ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various
... Spain, laid like pieces of a golden pavement into the sea-blue, chased, as we stoop nearer to them, with bossy beaten work of mountain chains, and glowing softly with terraced gardens, and flowers heavy with frankincense, mixed among masses of laurel, and orange and plumy palm, that abate with their grey-green shadows the burning of the marble rocks, and of the ledges of porphyry sloping under lucent sand. Then let us pass farther towards the north, ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... the tree, groups of tiny figures in painted plaster told the whole Christmas Day story from the moment of the first sight of the star by the shepherds who watched their flocks to the arrival, at the manger, of the Wise Men, bearing gold, frankincense and myrrh. ...
— Maida's Little Shop • Inez Haynes Irwin
... the desert. The smoke rising from these scorched thorns, moreover, rose straight as a column, and shed a fragrance that perfumed all the world, so that the nations exclaimed: "Who is this that cometh out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke, perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, with all powders ...
— THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME III BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS - FROM THE EXODUS TO THE DEATH OF MOSES • BY LOUIS GINZBERG
... warehouses—built on that wondrous Euphrates—were packed with "merchandise of gold, silver, precious stones, of pearls, fine linen, purple, silk, scarlet, and all rare woods, and all manner of vessels of ivory, brass, iron, marble, cinnamon, odours, ointments, frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour, wheat, beasts, sheep, horses, chariots, ...
— The Mark of the Beast • Sidney Watson
... To those whose frankincense and myrrh Perfumed the sacred courts with alms,— Were gracious ministers to her, Who found the largess in her palms, And him the ...
— The Mistress of the Manse • J. G. Holland
... persevered in their profession after repeated warnings, "as not doubting, whatever it was they professed, that at any rate contumacy and inflexible obstinacy ought to be punished." He required them to invoke the gods, to sacrifice wine and frankincense to the images of the Emperor, and to blaspheme Christ; "to which," he adds, "it is said no real Christian can be compelled." Renegades informed him that "the sum total of their offence or fault was meeting before light on an appointed day, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03 • Various
... has worked successfully a patent for rendering belt leather more pliable, and lessening the tendency to stretch. Under this treatment the leather is either curried or rough dried, and then soaked in a solution of wood, resin, and gum thus, or frankincense, first melted together, and then dissolved, by the application of heat, in boiled or linseed oil. The leather, after this process, is soaked in petroleum or carbon bisulphide containing a little India-rubber ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 598, June 18, 1887 • Various
... the happy mother, and a group surrounding her That knelt with costly presents of frankincense and myrrh; And I thrilled with awe and wonder, as a murmur on the air Came drifting o'er the hearing in a melody ...
— The Complete Works • James Whitcomb Riley
... lock, pushed away the bolt and opened the rusty, singing door. The cold, damp air together with the mixed smell of the dampness of stones, frankincense, and dead flesh breathed upon the girls. They fell back, huddling closely into a timorous flock. Tamara alone went ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... his head from his heels; so he searched the place right and left for his daughter, but found her not; whereat he was troubled sore with concern galore and his wits forlore. Then he bade bring hot water and virgin vinegar and frankincense[FN8] and mingling them together, blew the mixture into the Wazir's nostrils and shook him, whereupon he cast the Bhang forth of his stomach, as it were a bit of cheese. He repeated the process, whereupon the Minister came to himself and the King questioned him of his ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton
... that did not rise from sense, And rose too high to stoop to it, And framed aloft like frankincense In censers round ...
— Poems: Patriotic, Religious, Miscellaneous • Abram J. Ryan, (Father Ryan)
... of Thebes, it came into my thought To stand before some holy altar-place With frankincense and garlands. For the king, Transported by the tempest of his fear, Runs wild in grief, nor like a man of sense Reasons of present things from what hath been. Each tongue o'ermasters him that tells of ...
— The Seven Plays in English Verse • Sophocles
... dish, and put it at her feet; she then took a reed pen, some ink from a small bottle, and a pair of scissors, and wrote down several characters on a paper, singing, or rather chanting, words which were not intelligible to her young companion. Amine then threw frankincense and coriander seed into the chafing dish, which threw out a strong aromatic smoke; and desiring Pedro to sit down by her on a small stool, she took the boy's right hand and held it in her own. She then ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... in them days," continued Miss Susan. "They had myrrh an' frankincense, an' I dunno what all. I never make my mincemeat 'thout snuffin' at the spice-box to freshen up my mind. No matter where I start, some way or another I al'ays git back to Solomon. Well, if Cap'n Ben wants to see foreign ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... of the shepherds, the wise men from the East reached Bethlehem, and in a house they found Joseph, and Mary, and Jesus. Then they fell down and worshipped Jesus, opening the treasures they had brought, and offering Him precious gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. But God warned them not to go back to Herod, to tell him where the new-born King of the Jews was, and they returned to their own ...
— Mother Stories from the New Testament • Anonymous
... the road does not lead to the idol alone. Jews are not allowed to sell to non-Jews any of the following things, because they can be used for purposes of heathen worship:—Fir cones, white figs, or their stems, frankincense, and a white cock. A white cock may, however, be sold if one of its claws has been cut off, since non-Jews do not sacrifice an animal when ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various
... making an incision in the side with a sharp Ethiopian stone, they draw out the intestines through the aperture. Having cleansed and washed them with palm wine they cover them with pounded aromatics, and afterwards filling the cavity with powder of pure, myrrh, cassia, and other fragrant substances, frankincense excepted, they sew it up again. This being done, they salt the body, keeping it in natron seventy days, to which period they are strictly confined. When the seventy days are over they wash the body and wrap it up entirely in bands of fine linen smeared on their ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... precious stones, and of pearls and fine linen, and purple, and silk and scarlet, and all thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all manner vessels of most precious wood, and of brass and iron and marble. And cinnamon, and odours, and ointments, and frankincense, and wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts, and sheep, and horses, and chariots, and ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown
... spoke, In tones abrupt that startled his own ears With their strange harshness; but with thanks profuse She guided him, still holding his cold hand In her warm, dainty palm, unto a cave, Whence a rare glory issued, and a smell Of spice and roses, frankincense and balm. They entering stood within a marble hall, With straight, slim pillars, at whose farther end The goddess led him to a spiral flight Of stairs, descending always 'midst black gloom Into the very bowels of the earth. Down these, with fearful swiftness, ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus
... church for disinfecting or deodorizing purposes. The churchwardens' accounts of St. Peter's, Barnstaple, for 1741 contain the entry: "Pd. for Tobacco and Frankincense burnt in the Church 2s. 6d." Sprigs of juniper, pitch, and "sweete wood," in combination with incense, were often used for the ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... insinuations. I will not hear one syllable against it. The weather? There never was such weather. The weather? Oh, for the tongues of men and angels, to chant the glory of the weather. The weather is made of sugar and spice, of frankincense and myrrh, of milk and honey, of every conceivable ingredient that's nice. The sky is an inverted bowl of Sevres—that priceless bleu-royal; and there are appetising little clouds of whipped cream sticking to it. The air is full of gold, like eau-de-vie de Dantzic;—if ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... waxy, and so highly fragrant and spicy, that it is largely used in perfumery, in pastiles, precious candles, hair-powders, and pomatum. The Turks use it in cooking, and also carry it to Mecca, for the same purpose that frankincense is carried to St. Peter's in Rome. Some wine merchants drop a few grains into claret, ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... day when you refused to help me hold up the caravan of Orientals with my men, I have hated you. They had much frankincense and precious spices and gold. With one blow we should have provided ourselves with enough for many a long year. ...
— I.N.R.I. - A prisoner's Story of the Cross • Peter Rosegger
... as I have observed in the former chapter, are called slatees, who, besides slaves, and the merchandise which they bring for sale to the whites, supply the inhabitants of the maritime districts with native iron, sweet-smelling gums and frankincense, and a commodity called shea-toulou, ...
— Travels in the Interior of Africa - Volume 1 • Mungo Park
... year visit the ports, Zeyla and Barbara, laden with ivory, ostrich feathers, ghee, saffrons, gums, and myrrh. In return are brought blue and white calicoes, Indian piece goods, Indian prints, silks, and shawls, red cotton yarn, silk threads, beads, frankincense, copper ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various
... worthy is the Lamb that was slain. We treat Him ill. Bipeds of the masculine gender assume the piping phraseology of poor old women in presence of Him before whom the Eastern Magi fell down and worshiped,—ay, and opened their treasures, and presented unto Him gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. They will give their "mites" as if what they do give were their "all." It is utterly unfair to magnify the little we do for Him by calling it a sacrifice, or pretend we are doing all we can by assuming the ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... hush succeed the plaintive hymn, The anthem cease to swell in rhythmic praise, Or vaulted dome re-echo with the sound Of pipe, of organ, harp and dulcimer; The voice of sacerdotal eloquence Become as silent as the unborn thought; The fragrant perfume of the frankincense, The scent of swinging censor and of myrrh, Supplanted by foul odors of decay; The sacred flame extinguished and forgot, Its votaries and congregations fled; The forms who ministered and forms who knelt, The burnished altar and the hoary priest, ...
— Mountain idylls, and Other Poems • Alfred Castner King
... field of its Imagination. For by these, either down to the disturbed spirit, "[Greek: kekoptai kai charassetai pedon];" or around the quiet spirit, and on all the laws of conduct that hold it, as a fair vase its frankincense, are ordained the pure colors, and engraved the ...
— Aratra Pentelici, Seven Lectures on the Elements of Sculpture - Given before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... tree furnishes the resin known as olibanum, which is supposed to have been the frankincense of the ancients. It is sometimes used in medicine as an astringent and stimulant, and is employed, because of its grateful perfume, ...
— Catalogue of Economic Plants in the Collection of the U. S. Department of Agriculture • William Saunders
... lilac, saffron, begonia, peau d'Espagne, acacia, carnation, liban, fleur de Takeoka, cypress, oil of almonds, benzoin, jacinth, rue, shrub, olea, clematis, the hediosma of Jamaica, olive, vanilla, cinnamon, petunia, lotus, frankincense, sorrel, neroli from Japan, jonquil, verbena, spikenard, thyme, hyssop, and decaying orchids. This quintessential medley was as the sonorous blasts of Berlioz, repugnant and exquisite; it swayed the soul of Baldur as the wind sways the flame. There were ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... balm That was wafted abroad from the Forest of Thyme (For it rolled all round that curious clime With its magical clouds of perfumed trees.) And the blind man cried, "Our help is at hand, Oh, brothers, remember the old command, Remember the frankincense and myrrh, Make way, make way for those little ones there; Make way, make way, I have seen them afar Under a great white Eastern star; For I am the mad blind man who sees!" Then he whispered, softly—Of such as these; And through the hush of the cloven crowd We passed to the gates of the City, ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... the heart grows bright, The world is sweet in sound and sight, Glad thoughts and birds take flower and flight, The heather kindles toward the light, The whin is frankincense and flame. ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... with the master to seeke oxen, fell sicke and shortly died, which might haue bene cured by letting of blood before it had bin settled. Before our departure we had in this place some thousand weight of pitch, or rather a kind of gray and white gumme like vnto frankincense, as clammie as turpentine, which in melting groweth as blacke as pitch, and is very brittle of it selfe, but we mingled it with oile, whereof wee had 300 iarres in the prize which we tooke to the Northward ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt
... frankincense on the same altar; one falls there early and another late, but it makes ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... every side around Pure happiness is found, With all the blooming beauty of the world; There fragrant smoke, upcurled From altars where the blazing fire is dense With perfumed frankincense, Burned unto gods in heaven, Through all the land is driven, Making its pleasant place odorous With scented gales, and sweet ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... collars of their respective orders. Their Majesties, the Prince of Wales, and three eldest Princesses, went to the Chapel Royal, preceded by the heralds. The Duke of Manchester carried the sword of state. The king and prince made offering at the altar of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, according to the annual custom. At night their Majesties played at hazard with the nobility, for the benefit of the groom-porter; and 'twas said the king won 600 guineas; the queen, 360; Princess Amelia, twenty; Princess ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... went out from the palace, the royal children offered their hands to me; we walked afterward to the Great Gates. I was placed in a house of a king's son, in which were delicate things, a place of coolness, fruits of the granary, treasures of the White House, clothes of the King's guardrobe, frankincense, the finest perfumes of the King and the nobles whom he loves, in every chamber. All the servitors were in ...
— Egyptian Literature
... the strength of the sun while in our world it is night, and the space of crimsonflowered meadows before their city is full of the shade of frankincense-trees, and of fruits of gold. And some in horses, and in bodily feats, and some in dice, and some in harp-playing have delight; and among them thriveth all fair-flowering bliss; and fragrance streameth ever through the lovely land, as they mingle incense of every ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... ruin. Priscilla and her affianced chose this for their Sabbath walk, for it is only through nature that the Protestants in Macao can worship nature's God, and surely the incense of flowers could bear to Him on high the thanksgiving of those two happy hearts, as truly as the frankincense and myrrh which the good Fathers of the last century burnt upon Mt. Nillau. The narrow but well paved streets with their stuccoed houses, barred windows and little peep-holes at the doors, for questioning the doubtful applicants for admission, ...
— In Macao • Charles A. Gunnison
... post never before or after filled so worthily. He not only contributed himself several articles to the "Asiatic Researches," published by the Society, viz., "On the Sect of Jina," "On the Indian and Arabic Divisions of the Zodiack," and "On the Frankincense of the Ancients;" but he encouraged also many useful literary undertakings, and threw out, among other things, an idea which has but lately been carried out, viz., aCatalogue raisonn of all that is extant in Asiatic literature. His own studies ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... of it. Now therefore return to your own possessions and dwell in your island." Thus he proclaimed by a herald to the Delians; and after this he piled up and burned upon the altar three hundred talents' weight of frankincense. ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 2 (of 2) • Herodotus
... there dissolv'd he lay, the dust again Uproll'd spontaneous, and the self-same form Instant resumed. So mighty sages tell, The' Arabian Phoenix, when five hundred years Have well nigh circled, dies, and springs forthwith Renascent. Blade nor herb throughout his life He tastes, but tears of frankincense alone And odorous amomum: swaths of nard And myrrh his funeral shroud. As one that falls, He knows not how, by force demoniac dragg'd To earth, or through obstruction fettering up In chains invisible the powers of man, ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... blind from birth, once said to his Mother: "I am sure than I can see, Mother!" In the desire to prove to him his mistake, his Mother placed before him a few grains of frankincense, and asked, "What is it?" The young Mole said, "It is a pebble." His Mother exclaimed: "My son, I am afraid that you are not only blind, but that you have ...
— Aesop's Fables • Aesop
... soul is kept by all the body, Itself the body's guard, and source of weal: For they with common roots cleave each to each, Nor can be torn asunder without death. Not easy 'tis from lumps of frankincense To tear their fragrance forth, without its nature Perishing likewise: so, not easy 'tis From all the body nature of mind and soul To draw away, without the whole dissolved. With seeds so intertwined even from birth, They're dowered ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... shalt not evade me thus," said he, indignant at the slight which was put upon his spells. He drew a little ebony box from his bosom, and on opening it smoke issued therefrom, like the smell of frankincense. With this fumigation he used many uncouth and horrible words, hard names, and so forth, which probably had no existence save in the teeming issue of his own brain. During this operation groans were heard, at first low and indistinct, then loud and vehement; soon they broke into ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... Europe, was fully installed at Atacama and Cuzco, in Peru, at Cholulu, on the magnificent and volcano-lighted peaks of Mexico; and along the fertile deltas of the Mississippi valley. Altar-beds for a sacred fire, lit to the Great Spirit, under the name and symbolic form of Ceezis, or the sun, where the frankincense of the nicotiana was offered, with hymns and genuflections, have been discovered, in many instances, under the earth-heaps and artificial mounds and places of sepulture of the ancient inhabitants. Intelligent Indians yet living, among the North American tribes, point ...
— The Myth of Hiawatha, and Other Oral Legends, Mythologic and Allegoric, of the North American Indians • Henry R. Schoolcraft
... I have observed in the former chapter, are called Slatees; who, besides slaves, and the merchandize which they bring for sale to the whites, supply the inhabitants of the maritime districts with native iron, sweet smelling gums and frankincense, and a commodity called Shea-toulou, which, literally translated, signifies tree-butter. This commodity is extracted by means of boiling water from the kernel of a nut, as will be more particularly described hereafter; it has the consistence and appearance of butter; and is ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... made the woods ring with the echoes of "Hold the Fort." The grandeur of towering pines, the mysterious dimness of illimitable arcades, and the peculiar resinous odor that stole like lingering ghosts of myrrh, frankincense and onycha through the vaulted solitude of a deserted hoary sanctuary, all these phases of primeval Southern forests combined to weave a spell that the stranger could ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... came into the house and saw the young child with Mary his mother; and they fell down and worshipped him; and opening their treasures they offered unto him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh." Is there anything more beautiful in the Bible, or in all literature? The imagination of painter or poet may well kindle at the scene. There are the wondering mother, the worshiping wise men bowing down, the shining fragrant gifts, and in the midst, as the center and ...
— A Wonderful Night; An Interpretation Of Christmas • James H. Snowden
... certain bird called a phoenix. Of this there is never but one at a time, and that lives five hundred years. And when the time of its dissolution draws near, that it must die, it makes itself a nest of frankincense, and myrrh, and other spices, into which, when its time is fulfilled, it enters ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... of love they have rendered Unto the new-born King, Their gold and myrrh and frankincense, The best that ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... and he gazed upon us a grave welcome from the pleading, affected, tired eyes. He had a slight cough, too, which I rather fancied was assumed for the occasion. Then we all sat down, and he talked to us in a low, sad, monotonous voice; and there was a smell of frankincense about—no doubt a band of worshippers had lately been visiting at the shrine; and, at papa's request, he showed me some of his trays of jewels with a wearied air. And some drawings of Botticelli that papa ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... these have spread over the country, some have probably died out, and others failed to spread, like a lonely specimen which stands in what was the Botanic Garden of Loanda, and, though most useful in yielding a substitute for frankincense, is the only one of the kind ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... Bacon's sapient deliverance: "It is like that the brain of man waxeth moister and fuller upon the full of the moon; and therefore it were good for those that have moist brains, and are great drinkers, to take sume of lignum aloes, rosemary, frankincense, etc., about the full of the moon. It is like, also, that the humours in men's bodies increase and decrease as the moon doth; and therefore it were good to purge some day or two after the full; for that then the humours will ...
— Moon Lore • Timothy Harley
... stress is laid on its vicinity to the coffee and gum districts, and the certainty, that when it was under the settled rule of British law, the traffic in these rich products, as well as in the gold-dust, ivory, and frankincense of the African coast, would once more centre in its long-neglected harbour. But it was speedily found that the insecurity of communication with the interior opposed a serious obstacle to the realization of these prospects—the European residents and the troops were ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... tormenting play, That too fair face, that blinds when look'd upon! Venus comes in all her might, Quits Cyprus for my heart, nor lets me tell Of the Parthian, hold in flight, Nor Scythian hordes, nor aught that breaks her spell. Heap the grassy altar up, Bring vervain, boys, and sacred frankincense; Fill the sacrificial cup; A victim's blood ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace
... we go to worship him," they answered. "These presents of gold, frankincense and myrrh are for Him. When we find Him we will take the crowns off our heads and lay them at His feet. Come ...
— Twilight Stories • Various
... Impiety and infidelity of Alcithoe and her sisters. Story of Pyramus and Thisbe. Amour of Mars and Venus. The lovers caught by Vulcan in a net. Sol's love for Leucothoe, and her change to a tree of frankincense. Clytie transformed to a sunflower. Tale of Salmacis and Hermaphroditus. Transformation of Alcithoe and her sisters to bats. Juno's fury. Madness of Athamas; and deification of Ino and Melicertes. Change ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid
... to kiss my hand. On the contrary, begone with all speed. For, methinks, you are winsome of face, albeit black as the Magian King that bore the frankincense and myrrh; and it is not becoming I should look on you longer, seeing how danger is forever dogging the lonely man's steps. Wherefore suffer me now to leave you, commending you to God's care. And forgive me, if I have failed aught in politeness towards you, lady. For the good St. Francis was used ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France
... Dosiadas of Rhodes, form four words, and seem to be addressed to some "Olympian," who, the dedicator hopes "may live to offer sacrifice for many years." The altar states that it is not stained with the blood of victims, nor perfumed with frankincense, that it is not made of gold and silver; but formed by the hand of the Graces and the Muses. In the "Second Altar," also usually attributed to Dosiadas of Rhodes, we find not only a fanciful outline formed by long and short verses, but also a studious ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... the glare and glamor of the dreams we dreamed of old, But the Wise of earth have brought us of their frankincense and gold. ...
— Oklahoma Sunshine • Freeman E. (Freeman Edwin) Miller
... The forest and the jungle were his birthright. No creature that went upon the ground upon four feet, or climbed among the trees, or crawled upon its belly had any advantage over the ape-man in his native heath. As myrrh and frankincense were the dank odors of rotting vegetation in the nostrils of the great Tarmangani. He squared his broad shoulders and lifting his head filled his lungs with the air that he loved best. The heavy fragrance of ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... infested these seas, and who were justly regarded as formidable enemies. These pirates principally inhabit the peninsula of Gohourat, now called Gujerat, where the fleet was on its way after calling at Tana—a country where is collected the frankincense—and Canboat, now Kambay, a town where there is a great trade in leather. Visiting Sumenath, a city of the peninsula, whose inhabitants are cruel, ferocious, and idolaters, and Kesmacoran, the modern city of Kedje, the capital of Makran, situated on the Indus near the sea, ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... heads down, lips moving, some looking on devoutly from the other side of the street! Oh, could he have followed his own Bridget, maid of all work, into the heart of that steaming throng, and bowed his head while the priests intoned their Latin prayers! could he have snuffed up the cloud of frankincense, and felt that he was in the great ark which holds the better half of the Christian world, while all around it are wretched creatures, some struggling against the waves in leaky boats, and some on ill-connected ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... Man"—perhaps the wisest and most eloquent revolutionary tract ever written—that Wilde frees himself most completely from the superficial eccentricities of his aesthetic pose, and indicates his recognition of a beauty in life, far transcending Tyrian dyes and carved cameos and frankincense and satin-wood and moon-stones and ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... The Other Wise Man, and Thomas Nelson Page's Santa Claus's Partner, at the Christmas season, and it has the advantages of extreme brevity, a fresh breeziness of style, surprise in the plot, and romantic interest. The magi brought various gifts to the Child in the manger—gold, frankincense, myrrh—but only one gift, that of love. O. Henry does not often moralize, but no reader ever finds fault with his concluding paragraph. The author's real name was William Sidney Porter. He was born in Greensboro, N. C., in 1862, and died in New York City, in 1910, the most widely read of short-story ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... cometh up out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke, Perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, With all powders ...
— Union And Communion - or Thoughts on the Song of Solomon • J. Hudson Taylor
... porcelain and ivory and rock crystal, such great pots of musk and planks of cinnamon, as had never been seen on all the stalls of London. Her hold smelt like a garden of spices for all the benjamin and cloves, the nutmegs and the civet, the ambergris and frankincense. There was a fight before Raleigh's ship the 'Roebuck' could seize this enormous prize, yet somewhat a passive one on the part of the lumbering carrack, such a fight as may ensue between a great rabbit and the little stoat that sucks its life ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse
... their rich offerings of myrrh, frankincense, and gold, by the bed of the sleeping Christ Child, legend says that a shepherd maiden stood outside ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... alter stands, far out of sight, On which the image consecrated lies Of Christ's dear mother, called a virgin bright, An hundred lamps aye burn before her eyes, She in a slender veil of tinsel dight, On every side great plenty doth behold Of offerings brought, myrrh, frankincense ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... atmosphere may grow mephitic When Papist struggles with Dissenter, Impregnating its pristine clarity, —One, by his daily fare's vulgarity, Its gust of broken meat and garlic; —One, by his soul's too-much presuming To turn the frankincense's fuming An vapors of the candle starlike Into the cloud her wings she buoys on. Each that thus sets the pure air seething, May poison it for healthy breathing— But the Critic leaves no air to ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... gallant captain was more splendid and handsome than ever. But both his spirits and his habits had suffered. He had quarrelled with his aunt, and she was his bread and butter—ay, buttered on both sides. How lightly these young fellows quarrel with the foolish old worshippers who lay their gold, frankincense, and myrrh, at the feet of the handsome thankless idols. They think it all independence and high spirit, whereas we know it is nothing but a little egotistical tyranny, that unconsciously calculates even ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... in the bark of the shrubs in warm countries issues a gum resembling frankincense. This gum, as Gerard teaches, "drieth ulcers which are hollow, and filleth them with flesh if they be cast thereon." "Being mixed with oil of roses, it healeth chaps of the hands and feet." Bergius said "the lignum (wood) of Juniper is ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... the street policeman had made the passage clear before him. Ushers had kowtowed and the heads of fashionable women had nodded and smiled. His way had been a march of triumph. To Hamilton Burton it was all like the sniffing of frankincense and myrrh. His inner emotions were those of a great ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... publicly, reserved to the senatorial order [173]. That those who were chosen and approved of, might perform their functions under more solemn obligations, and with less inconvenience, he ordered that every senator, before he took his seat in the house, should pay his devotions, with an offering of frankincense and wine, at the altar of that God in whose temple the senate then assembled [174], and that their stated meetings should be only twice in the month, namely, on the calends and ides; and that in the months of September and October [175], a certain number only, chosen by lot, such as the ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... containing a charge against several persons; these, upon examination, denied they were, or ever had been, Christians. They repeated after me an invocation to the gods, and offered religious rites with wine and frankincense before your statue * * * and even reviled the name of Christ; whereas there is no forcing, it is said, those who are really Christians, into any of these compliances. * * * The rest owned indeed they had been of that number formerly, but had now (some ...
— The Prayer Book Explained • Percival Jackson
... the morning star in the midst of a cloud, and as the moon at the full; as the sun shining upon the temple of the Most High, and as the rainbow giving light in the bright clouds: and as the flower of roses in the spring of the year, as lilies by the rivers of waters, and as the frankincense-tree in summer; as fire and incense in the censer, and as a vessel of gold set with precious stones; as a fair olive-tree budding forth fruit, and as a cypress which groweth up to the clouds. When he put on the robe ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... dribbling springs; swarm over old moraines; circle the peaty swamps and part and meet about clean still lakes; scale the stony gullies; tormented, bowed, persisting to the door of the storm chambers, tall priests to pray for rain. The spring winds lift clouds of pollen dust, finer than frankincense, and trail it out over high ...
— The Land of Little Rain • Mary Austin
... spur to him, {indignantly} exclaiming; others, by {silent} assent fulfil their parts. Yet the {entire} destruction of the human race is a cause of grief to them all, and they inquire what is to be the form of the earth in future, when destitute of mankind? who is to place frankincense[48] on the altars? and whether it is his design to give up the nations for a prey to the wild beasts? The ruler of the Gods forbids them making these enquiries, to be alarmed (for that the rest should be his care); and he promises, {that} from a wondrous source {he will ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso
... was filled, and stifling with heat and frankincense, and contadini, and wax lights burning before the shrine, on which the sun shone. There were beautiful faces among the pajine (people in fine raiment), showing what can be made from the contadine (people in coarse clothes) ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. (11)And coming into the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and did homage to him; and opening their treasures, they presented to him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. (12)And being warned by God in a dream, not to return to Herod, they departed into their own ...
— The New Testament of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. • Various
... sailed even beyond the "Pillars of Hercules" into the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea. Through their hands "passed the gold and pearls of the east and the purple of Tyre, slaves, ivory, lion and panther skins from the interior of Africa, frankincense from Arabia, the linen of Egypt, the pottery and fine wares of Greece, the copper of Cyprus, the silver of Spain, tin from ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee
... O, my sweet wife, upbraid me not with that; gain savours sweetly from any thing; he that respects to get, must relish all commodities alike, and admit no difference between oade and frankincense, or the most precious balsamum and ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson
... full of odors, symbolize the prayers of saints. Under the Mosaic dispensation, the frankincense and odors offered at the tabernacle were emblematic of prayer and praise to God. "Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... the first time, the mother resumed her place. When the wise men came into the house they saw the young child, with Mary his mother, and fell down and worshipped him; and when they had opened their treasures they presented unto him gifts, gold, and frankincense, and myrrh. The old Eastern custom, which placed the child before the mother, was now understood. God guarded against making Mary first, and at the same time provided for her a place. When God appeared to Joseph in a dream, he did not say, Take the mother and child, but ...
— The True Woman • Justin D. Fulton
... very particular in describing their age, appearance, and offerings. Melchior, the first, was old, had gray hair, and a long beard; and offered 'gold' to Christ, in, acknowledgment of His sovereignty. Gaspar, the second, was young, and had no beard; and he offered 'frankincense,' in recognition of our Lord's divinity. Balthasar, the third, was of a dark complexion, had a large beard, and offered 'myrrh' to our Saviour's humanity. We should, we confess, miss such pleasant little myths in other old books besides Bede's Histories. ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... animals, are often seen shining through it, which, entangled in it while in a liquid state, became enclosed as it hardened. [264] I should therefore imagine that, as the luxuriant woods and groves in the secret recesses of the East exude frankincense and balsam, so there are the same in the islands and continents of the West; which, acted upon by the near rays of the sun, drop their liquid juices into the subjacent sea, whence, by the force of tempests, they are thrown out upon the opposite coasts. If the nature of ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus
... far as the Sea of India, and fetch thence some gold, and dip it in the water that flows from under the Tree of Life, and give it to Adam. Likewise He commanded Gabriel to speak to the cherub that kept the gate of the garden, and go in and fetch some frankincense; and Raphael to bring myrrh also from the garden. And they did so. And Michael brought seventy rods of gold, and Gabriel twelve pounds weight of frankincense, and Raphael three pounds of myrrh; and these were all laid up in the ...
— Old Testament Legends - being stories out of some of the less-known apochryphal - books of the old testament • M. R. James
... frankincense and myrrh," he acknowledged. "I feel proud of you, and I don't care who hears me say so. Let me see; your birthday's next week, isn't it? How about arranging something in the nature of a ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... in great part, but an influx of tradition, speculation, imagination, and sentiment, from Persia? The Gnostic Christians even had a scripture called "Zoroaster's Apocalypse."43 "The wise men from the east," who knelt before the infant Christ, "and opened their treasures, and gave him gifts, gold, frankincense, and myrrh," were Persian Magi. We may imaginatively regard that sacred scene as an emblematical figure of the ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... he has ascended to the mountains of myrrh and the hill of frankincense, and has seen the day break and the shadows flee away. But, brothers, let us cherish no such idle notion as though James Powell had now forgotten, or has ceased to be interested in the Chinaman, the Indian and the ...
— The American Missionary, Volume 42, No. 12, December, 1888 • Various
... indeed for the delicate effects of word combination, if his humor had been less chilled by hate, if his wit had been of a lighter and more playful vein, he might have laughed superstition out of England. When he described the dreadful power of holy water and frankincense and the book of exorcisms "to scald, broyle and sizzle the devil," or "the dreadful power of the crosse and sacrament of the altar to torment the devill and to make him roare," or "the astonishable power of nicknames, reliques and asses ears,"[44] he revealed a faculty of fun-making ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein
... {124} And, as Pindar says again, "for them shineth below the strength of the sun, while in our world it is night, and the space of crimson-flowered meadows before their city is full of the shade of frankincense-trees and of fruits of gold. And some in horses and in bodily feats, and some in dice, and some in harp-playing have delight, and among them thriveth all fair flowering bliss; and fragrance ever streameth ...
— In the Wrong Paradise • Andrew Lang
... overcome with grief, endeavoured, by every means in his power, to recall her to life. At last, finding all his efforts unavailing, he sprinkled her grave with heavenly nectar, and immediately there sprang forth from the spot a shoot of frankincense, which ...
— Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome • E.M. Berens
... hers all unconfused of sense, Lustral, austere, and of the spirit fine; No cloudy fumes of myrrh and frankincense Drug in her arms the ecstasy divine; But stellar awe that kneels in high suspense, And hallowed glories of the ...
— A Jongleur Strayed - Verses on Love and Other Matters Sacred and Profane • Richard Le Gallienne
... proceeding slowly down a side aisle of that magnificent fane, prostrated herself upon the steps of an altar of black marble, upon which burned in silver cassolettes, two small glimmering fires, sparingly fed with frankincense, and serving rather to render visible, than to illumine the gloom of the niche in which the altar stood; whilst the tapers which twinkled like glow-worms here and there in the body of the spacious temple, indicated the presence of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, Number 489, Saturday, May 14, 1831 • Various
... showbread in the temple were to have frankincense strewed upon them as they stood upon the golden table, which was a type of the sweet perfumes of the sanctification of the ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin
... regret to speak thus of a book by so eminent a writer as Mrs. Stowe; but when any one at this time undertakes to build up a novel out of such material as cloisters, monks, and nuns, Beato Angelico and frankincense, cavaliers and Savonarola, with the occasional 'purple patch' of a rhyming Latin hymn—in short, when we see the long-exhausted melo-dramatic style, which was years ago thoroughly quizzed in 'Firmilian,' revived in ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... the frankincense," said Eve, laughing, as Sir George entered the drawing-room; "but you will remember we have no church establishment, and dare not take such liberties with the ceremonials ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... children of the town would go into the King's gardens, and gather nosegays for the Pilgrims, and bring them to them with much affection. Here also grew camphire, with spikenard, and saffron, calamus, and cinnamon, with all its trees of frankincense, myrrh, and aloes, with all chief spices. With these the Pilgrims' chambers were perfumed, while they staid here; and with these were their bodies anointed, to prepare them to go over the river when the time appointed ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... that the lines would let their meaning meet us with a more level gaze. In the poems of this class there is riper thought and a clearer intuition, toward which all the previous poems of Mr. Browning appear to have struggled, faring from the East to contribute myrrh, frankincense, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... all these I followed the figure of Artaban moving steadily onward, until he arrived at Bethlehem. And it was the third day after the three wise men had come to that place and had found Mary and Joseph, with the young child, Jesus, and had lain their gifts of gold and frankincense and ...
— The Story of the Other Wise Man • Henry Van Dyke
... hillocks are all covered with groves of pine trees, with plenty of grass growing under them, and so free from underwood that you may gallop a horse for forty or fifty miles an end. In the low grounds and islands in the river there are cypress, bay-trees, poplar, plane, frankincense or gum-trees, and aquatic shrubs. All part of the province are well watered; and, in digging a moderate depth, you never ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris
... day; some, of their own country provisions, with the best sauces of African cookery; and, by way of variety, another meal of pulse, according to the European taste. After breakfast they had water to wash themselves, while their apartments were perfumed with frankincense and lime-juice. Before dinner they were amused after the manner of their country; instruments of music were introduced: the song and the dance were promoted: games of chance were furnished them: the men played and sang, ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808) • Thomas Clarkson
... the conclusion of your speech is better than the commencement. It is better to sacrifice myrrh and frankincense than virtue and wisdom, thoughts than deeds. Would that all men were as ready as yourself to dispark their little selfish enclosures, and burn out all their hedges of prickly briers and brambles—turning the evil into the good—the ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various
... helped them, and they would have dressed the baby in fine linen, and got him the richest room their money would get, and they would have made the gold that the wise men brought into a crown for his little head, and would have burnt the frankincense before him. And so our little manger-baby would have been taken away from us. No more the stable-born Saviour—no more the poor Son of God born for us all, as strong, as noble, as loving, as worshipful, ...
— The Seaboard Parish Volume 1 • George MacDonald
... smoke of the frankincense, Which there was imaged forth, the eyes and nose Were in the yes and ...
— Dante's Purgatory • Dante |
