"Misunderstood" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... misunderstood my involuntary gesture. I had all my best duds on, and when a lot of women stare it makes the woman they stare at peacock naturally, and—and—well, ask Tom what he thinks of my style when I'm on parade. At any ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... Sloane MS. 2593, in the British Museum (c. 1450); the minstrel's song-book which contains the famous carols: 'I sing of a maiden,' and 'Adam lay i-bounden.' This ballad was first printed by Ritson in his Ancient Songs (1790); but he misunderstood the phrase 'Robyn lyth' in the burden for the name 'Robin Lyth,' and ingeniously found a cave on Flamborough Head ...
— Ballads of Robin Hood and other Outlaws - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - Fourth Series • Frank Sidgwick
... report, at the close of 1832, was a defence of what has since been called, and outside of India and of Scotland has too often been misunderstood as, educational missions or Christian Colleges. To a purely divinity college for Asiatic Christians he preferred a divinity faculty as part of an Arts and Science College,[29] in which the converts study side by side with their inquiring countrymen, the inquirers are influenced ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith
... effervescence of his youthful military ardor, and doomed to disappointment. The report of the scouts had been either exaggerated or misunderstood. The ninety Frenchmen in military array dwindled down ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... lastly, as here, with more of circumstance: "I staid up till the bellman came by with his bell under my window, as I was writing of this very line, and cried, 'Past one of the clock, and a cold, frosty, windy morning.'" Such passages are not to be misunderstood. The appeal to Samuel Pepys years hence is unmistakable. He desires that dear, though unknown, gentleman keenly to realise his predecessor; to remember why a passage was uncleanly written; to recall (let us fancy, with a sigh) the tones of the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... her in dismay. "But that is impossible!" Then, as Flora turned away, she kept her hand. "Think, think," she urged, "how you will be misunderstood." ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain
... soon a reality, and I was snubbed or avoided in the most decided way. I tried to bear this silently, to act as if I didn't care for a while, but I became so lonely at length I thought I would try to conciliate them. I dare say, however, my shy manner was still misunderstood, for I was not encouraged to go on. What I suffered at this time I have never forgotten. The girls were no worse than other girls, but they had started out on a wrong track, and gradually the whole flock of them, one led on by what another would say or do, were ...
— A Flock of Girls and Boys • Nora Perry
... pleasure to have seen a great man." Distinctly through the gathering mists of years do his face and form rise up before the mind's eye: an image of manly self-reliance, of frank courage, of generous impulse; a frank friend, an open enemy; a man whom many misunderstood, but whom no one could understand ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... who seemed by far the most popular character of the two, had just arrived with him; and both appeared to know about as much French one as the other, and to make themselves equally understood or misunderstood. That evening, my friend and travelling companion, B—— and I dined at Dotesio's, in the Rue Castiglione, where we had an excellent dinner, washed down by more excellent wine. The next day found us at Marseilles, at the Hotel D'Orient, concerning which hostelry ...
— Notes in North Africa - Being a Guide to the Sportsman and Tourist in Algeria and Tunisia • W. G. Windham
... ambitious, Catherine de' Medici had no other passion than that of power. Superstitious and fatalistic, like so many superior men, she had no sincere belief except in occult sciences. Unless this double mainspring is known, the conduct of Catherine de' Medici will remain forever misunderstood. As we picture her faith in judicial astrology, the light will fall upon two personages, who are, in fact, the philosophical subjects of ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac
... peremptoriness, and misunderstood it. "This is carrying sisterly love a long way," said he. "I must try and rise to your level. ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... Clontarf in the year 1014, though they were aided by other Celtic tribes who hated Brian and his schemes even more than they hated the foreigners. Important though this battle was, its effect has been much exaggerated and misunderstood. It certainly did not bring the Danish power in Ireland to an end; Dublin was a flourishing Danish colony long afterwards—in fact it was thirty years after the battle that the Danish king of Dublin ...
— Is Ulster Right? • Anonymous
... internal constitution of other men, nor even of thine whom I now address. I see that in some external attributes they resemble me, but when, misled by that appearance, I have thought to appeal to something in common, and unburden my inmost soul to them, I have found my language misunderstood, like one in a distant and savage land. The more opportunities they have afforded me for experience, the wider has appeared the interval between us, and to a greater distance have the points of sympathy been withdrawn. With a spirit ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 344 (Supplementary Issue) • Various
... such men as these. Possibly the smug and self-satisfied do not care to; but men in distress—those who are worn, or old, or misunderstood—children, outcasts, those far from home and who long to get back, silently slip weak hands in theirs and ask, "May ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 4 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Painters • Elbert Hubbard
... destroying this ship? We have no great political guns aboard. On the contrary, the majority of the passengers are Americans. Besides, in this sober nineteenth century, the most wholesale murderers stop at including themselves among their victims. Depend upon it, you have misunderstood them, and have mistaken a photographic camera, or something equally innocent, for an ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the preacher, "I am in a strange land, where neither mine office nor my doctrine are known, and where, it would seem, both are greatly misunderstood. It is my duty so to bear me, that in my person, however unworthy, my Master's dignity may be respected, and that sin may take not confidence from relaxation of ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... Pittsburg landing, has been perhaps less understood, or, to state the case more accurately, more persistently misunderstood, than any other engagement between National and Confederate troops during the entire rebellion. Correct reports of the battle have been published, notably by Sherman, Badeau and, in a speech before a meeting of veterans, by General Prentiss; but all of these appeared long ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... about a change while the process is still going on, it is extremely difficult to write so as not to be misunderstood. For there are remote corners, even of the United States, where the primitive conditions still subsist, and where woman still bears her old-time relation to industry, where the industrial life of the girl flows on with no gap or ...
— The Trade Union Woman • Alice Henry
... boot, and with the naked toe just touched the trigger of his Martini. Ortheris misunderstood the movement, and the next instant the Irishman's rifle was dashed aside, while Ortheris stood before him, his eyes blazing ...
— Soldiers Three • Rudyard Kipling
... speak of the past and judge from the past, which may have been misrepresented and misunderstood by us? The churches, with their principles and their practice, are not a thing of the past. The churches are before us to-day, and we can judge of them to some purpose by their practical activity, ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... stray lamb among the knolls, was Lawrie Logan, who hailed us with a laughing voice, and then asked us, "Where is Wee Willie?—hae ye flung him like another Joseph into the pit?" The consternation of our faces could not be misunderstood—whether we told him or not what had happened we do not know—but he staggered, as if he would have fallen down—and then ran off with amazing speed—not towards Logan Braes—but the village. We continued helplessly to wander ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... she said, "that I am to blame. I have Developed. That first book of mine—I do not go back upon a word of it, mind, but it has been misunderstood, misapplied." ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... that, by this time, we had done with that stale, second-hand, one-sided, and misunderstood saying of Raffaelle's; or that at least, in these days of purer Christian light, men might have begun to get some insight into the meaning of it: Raffaelle was a painter of humanity, and assuredly there is something the matter with humanity, a few dovrebbe's, more or less, ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... never be able to determine how far the great Teacher may through his own speculations or misunderstood spiritual utterances have suggested the supernatural doctrines subsequently attributed to him, and by which his whole history and system soon became transformed; but no one who attentively studies the subject can fail to be struck by the absence of such dogmas from the earlier records ...
— A Reply to Dr. Lightfoot's Essays • Walter R. Cassels
... enlarged that to include a critical hostility to Sir Isaac, we have already recorded. Lady Harman was no longer simply a charming, suppressed young wife, crying out for attentive development; she became an ill-treated beautiful woman—misunderstood. Still scrupulously respecting his own standards, Mr. Brumley embarked upon the dangerous business of inventing just how Sir Isaac might be outraging them, and once his imagination had started to hunt in that field, it speedily brought in enough matter for a fine ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... for wealth and power, and must join the tiny minority who care nothing for such things, but live only in order to devote themselves selflessly to the good of the world. She warned us clearly that the way was difficult to tread, that we should be misunderstood and reviled by those who still lived in the world, and that we had nothing to look forward to but the hardest of hard work; and though the result was sure, no one could foretell how long it would take to arrive at it. ...
— A Textbook of Theosophy • C.W. Leadbeater
... example. Then, I've no money, and I can't do anything for a living, except serve in a shop. I shouldn't be free, either; so what's the good? Besides, I oughtn't to have married if I wasn't going to be happy. You see, I'm not a bit misunderstood or ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... expect, you'll hev to wait; 170 Folks never understand the folks they hate: She'll fin' some other grievance jest ez good, 'fore the month's out, to git misunderstood. England cool off! She'll do it, ef she sees She's run her head into a swarm o' bees. I ain't so prejudiced ez wut you spose: I hev thought England was the best thet goes; Remember (no, you can't), when I was reared, God save the King was all the tune ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... and scare off the wild beasts only to replace them with civil crops, cattle, corn, and men. Instead of the howling wilderness, they would have the village or the city, full of comfort and wealth and musical with knowledge and with love. How often are they misunderstood! Some savage hears the ring of the axe, the crash of falling timber, or the rifle's crack and the drop of wolf or bear, and cries out, "A destructive and dangerous man; he has no reverence for the ancient wilderness, but would abolish it and its inhabitants; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... lie beneath the sun trying to call themselves gardens! Oh! the pitiful little plots, unfenced, unused, entirely misunderstood by people who stick houses in the middle of ...
— American Cookery - November, 1921 • Various
... Book of Jonah. The value and message of the book of Jonah have in the past been largely overlooked because the true literary character of the book has been misunderstood. It was never intended by its author to be regarded as a historical narrative. Its hero Jonah, the son of Amittai, according to II Kings 14:25, lived during the reign of Jeroboam II (780-740 B.C.), and predicted ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent
... conquered and subdued, has been revived in fiercest heat by cordials, brandied peaches, wine-sauces, and similar apparently innocent refreshments. It is better to appear mean than to tempt to ruin, and in these days of temperance movements, no lady will be censured or misunderstood who banishes every drop of ...
— Frost's Laws and By-Laws of American Society • Sarah Annie Frost
... possessed of a devil! You will endeavour to upset shams and hypocrisies, and the men of your press will write you down and say you are seeking advertisement and notoriety for yourself. Was there ever a great thinker left unmartyred? Or a great writer that has not been misunderstood and condemned? You wish to help and serve humanity! Enthusiast! You would do far better to help and serve the Church! For the Church rewards; humanity has cursed and killed every great benefactor it ever had ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... laid down his travelling-bag and paper parcel, and lifting up both hands said, "Satan, avaunt." But Peter misunderstood him, and thought he ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... imprecations were not so uncommon that they could be taken as evidence of wilful murder. The prisoner refused to say what that troubled conversation was about, but who could question his right to take the risk of his silence being misunderstood? ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... villainous intentions, when finally comprehended, became radically modified under her coolly scornful rebuke. Welter, fat and sentimental, never was more than tiresomely saccharine; Ferris and Lyndhurst betrayed symptoms of being misunderstood, but it was a toss-up as to the degree ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers
... been difficult for two persons to have more utterly misunderstood each other. Brandilancia had reached the full maturity of his mental powers. His genius had created many charming women, but the ideal for which his lonely heart yearned had only gradually taken shape in his mind, and ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... putting him, as on the occasion of their first encounter, lamentably in the wrong. "Ah," she commented, her eyes dwelling on him. "Ah, I see. You have wondered. You have criticized. You have, I think, Mr. Jardine, misunderstood my life and its capacities. Allow me to explain. Your wife is the creature dearest to me in the world, and if you misread my devotion to her you endanger our relation. You would not, I am sure, wish to do that; is it not so? Allow me ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... "You misunderstood me. If you knew how I loved you, you would not twit me with my own words. Heaven knows I would sooner go back and drown myself in the lock than do anything or say anything that would offend you. Remember also that I asked you to be ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... see, Chawner, you misunderstood him. By the way, Bultitude, there was something you were ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... many parts.' Under what various aspects the Prince's character may have presented itself, in his younger days, I am not able to tell you. Since I have been here, he has played the part of a martyr to illness, misunderstood ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... the lines entitled A Child's Grave at Florence, which had apparently been misunderstood as implying the death of ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... spirit of love: further, it is a homage paid to the native and naked dignity of man, to the grand elementary principle of pleasure, by which he knows, and feels, and lives, and moves. We have no sympathy but what is propagated by pleasure: I would not be misunderstood; but wherever we sympathize with pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried on by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge, that is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation of particular ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... fitted for the next occasion of sentiment, which was at the Hotel Dieu whither they went after returning from the battlefield. It took all the mal-address of which travellers are masters to secure admittance, and it was not till they had rung various wrong bells, and misunderstood many soft nun-voices speaking French through grated doors, and set divers sympathetic spectators doing ineffectual services, that they at last found the proper entrance, and were answered in English that the porter ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... head of his cavalry straight on Mackay's centre. But for some unexplained reason his troopers had not followed him close; whether their new captain did not like the guns, or had misunderstood his orders, is not clear. Dunfermline, seeing his general's plumed hat waving above the smoke, had spurred out of the ranks with sixteen gentlemen, and with these sabres the guns were taken and silenced. Dundee, seeing that all went well on the ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... most constant of our guests; but his daughter, the disgraced queen, seldom visited our side of the bay. I was not, however, ignorant of her anxious desire for a reconciliation with Tamaahmaah; nor was the same wish to be misunderstood in the conduct and behavior of the king, in whose good opinion and confidence I had now acquired such a predominancy that I became acquainted with his most ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead
... marks as the beginning of the awakening of the country to church doctrine and practice. He and his brother were known as contributors to the Tracts for the Times, which were rousing the clergy in the same direction, but which were so much misunderstood, and excited so much obloquy, that Mr. Norris of Hackney, himself a staunch old-fashioned churchman, who had held up the light in evil times, said to his young friend, the Rev. Robert Francis Wilson, a first-class Oriel man, to whom ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge
... is to feel hurt and angry, to feel that we are misunderstood, that no one loves us. At such times it may be we want to hurt ourselves so that in some mysterious way we may hurt those who do not love us. We long to die so that they may be sorry. But these feelings do not come often and they soon pass. We ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... me for the act I am about to commit. I believe that my child's heart is great enough to understand me, and to forgive me. I have suffered my whole life long. I was married out of calculation, then despised, misunderstood, oppressed and constantly deceived ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... was turning, that I was going mad—I who accused Captain Guy of being insane! No! I had not heard aright! I had misunderstood? This was a mere phantom ...
— An Antarctic Mystery • Jules Verne
... . . . misunderstood me, and somewhat exceeded his instructions. You will make all the required preparations for withdrawing, but will hold your ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... nature and necessity of prayer are so often misunderstood! Yet the definition in our Catechism is clear and precise. There are four kinds of prayer; adoration, thanksgiving, petition for pardon, and for ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... But Dan had misunderstood the pigmy's wishes, for as soon as the long cane was clear he caught it up, turned back with Mak to where the serpent lay, and waited while the big black pierced a hole in the serpent's neck. The cane was passed through, and then each taking hold of one end, they ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn
... had not misunderstood Branwen's nature was evident, from the genuine look of sorrow and sympathy which instantly ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... hate so much as a secret," said he. He had no intention in this of animadverting upon Miss Stanbury's secret enmity, nor had he purposed to ask any question as to her relations with the old man. He had alluded to his dislike of having secrets of his own. But she misunderstood him. ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... assuming to pick a wife for him, but he did like the prospect of meeting a clever girl, and he opened the letter again to make sure that he had not misunderstood. He read again, "understands Emerson." John was pleased. Why? I think I can divine. John was vain of his own abilities, and he wanted a woman that could appreciate him. He would have told you that he wanted congenial society. But congenial female society to an ambitious man whose heart ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston
... monkey!' exclaimed Mrs. Linton, in surprise. 'But I'll not believe this idiotcy! It is impossible that you can covet the admiration of Heathcliff—that you consider him an agreeable person! I hope I have misunderstood you, Isabella?' ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... when he says system? Otherwise, why does he say that Shakspeare uses the passive for the active participle, when he explains the word not by the active participle, but by an adjective of totally different meaning? Is it not more likely that MR. HALLIWELL may have misunderstood Shakspeare's system, than that the latter should have used intelligible words, and precise forms of words, so at random? And, moreover, does not the critic confound two meanings of the word delightful; the one obsolete, full of delight, the ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 42, Saturday, August 17, 1850 • Various
... it is impossible that you should offend me; you have misunderstood and mistaken me. Don't suppose—pray don't suppose that I am changed or can ever ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... affair to be misunderstood by many; it therefore may not be thought improper, here, to set it in a juster light; and this cannot more exactly be given, than from his own words, called, A fair state of the Account, published in ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... I can't stand it to hear her cry so. I'll take the risk of being misunderstood," she decided with ...
— Grace Harlowe's Return to Overton Campus • Jessie Graham Flower
... be misunderstood for he says: "Brethren, ye have been called unto liberty." In order that nobody might mistake the liberty of which he speaks for the liberty of the flesh, the Apostle adds the explanatory note, "only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another." Paul now explains ...
— Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians • Martin Luther
... eloquence of soul for which one looks in vain save in the anguish-laden communion of Christ with His Father, He voiced His reverent gratitude that God had imparted a testimony of the truth to the humble and simple rather than to the learned and great; though misunderstood by men He was known for what He really was by the Father. Turning again to the people, He urged anew their acceptance of Him and His gospel, and His invitation is one of the grandest outpourings of spiritual emotion known to man: "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... introduction, and have never been superseded, and admit of no addition. I am not going to parallel any thing which is the work of man, and in the natural order, with what is from heaven, and in consequence infallible, and irreversible, and obligatory; but, after making this reserve, lest I should possibly be misunderstood, still I would remark that, in matter of fact, looking at the state of the case historically, Civilization too has its common principles, and views, and teaching, and especially its books, which have more or less been given from the earliest ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman
... The question, at this stage in Muller's meditation, could hardly be called a question any more. It was all too sadly clear to him now. Winkler met his death at the hand of the husband, who, discovering the planned rendezvous, had misunderstood its motive. ...
— The Lamp That Went Out • Augusta Groner
... in a corner, listened, and understood. Or where she misunderstood, it was an honest misunderstanding, which never does much hurt. Neither father nor mother spoke to her till they bade her good night. Neither saw the hungry heart under the mask of the still face. The father never imagined her already fit for the modelling she was ...
— Stephen Archer and Other Tales • George MacDonald
... published. Johnson said, he thought his style pretty good, but that he had blamed Henry the Second rather too much. 'Why, (said the King,) they seldom do these things by halves.' 'No, Sir, (answered Johnson,) not to Kings.' But fearing to be misunderstood, he proceeded to explain himself; and immediately subjoined, 'That for those who spoke worse of Kings than they deserved, he could find no excuse; but that he could more easily conceive how some might speak better of them than ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... How the Priest misunderstood the Prophet! Just because Bethel was the king's sanctuary and the royal residence and the seat of all the mighty in the land of Israel, Amos had selected it, above all other places, to preach ...
— Stories of the Prophets - (Before the Exile) • Isaac Landman
... deep voice had lost its richness and sounded hard. "I should like to tell you something of myself. Oh"—she laughed rather cynically—"I'm not going to bore you with a rhapsody intended to convey to you that I am a much misunderstood woman and all the rest of it. Only, if you are to see me again, I think I should like you to know just who and ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... to Lord Melbourne's continued correspondence with the Queen, after the change of Government. Baron Stockmar's remonstrance on the subject shows that he misunderstood the character of the ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... heart. 'Great God, I am recompensed! Surely this moment may repay a life of misery!' He could only receive her caresses in silence; but the sudden tears which started in his eyes spoke a language too expressive to be misunderstood. ...
— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe
... hearers of that cry misunderstood it, or cruelly pretended to do so, in order to find fresh food for mockery. 'Eloi' sounded like enough to 'Elijah' to suggest to some of the flinty hearts around a travesty of the piteous appeal. They must have been Jews, for the soldiers knew nothing about the prophet; and if they ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... even by the candid, except as in flashes of lightning. And then the anger of by-standers, uncandid, who got hurt by him; the hasty malevolences, the stupidities, the opacities: enough, in modern times, what is saying much, perhaps no man's motives, intentions, and procedure have been more belied, misunderstood, misrepresented, during his life. Nor, I think, since that, have many men fared worse, by the Limner or Biographic class, the favorable to him and the unfavorable; or been so smeared of and blotched of, and reduced to a mere blur and dazzlement of cross-lights, incoherences, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... misunderstood or failed to appreciate this extraordinary character, as one curious piece of evidence will serve to show. Milton is one of the most egotistic of poets. He makes no secret of the high value he sets ...
— Milton • Sir Walter Alexander Raleigh
... name the possibility that his acquaintance with the girl had been misunderstood by her relations shot into his mind. But in that case why had they dealt with him after this fashion? Then again he seemed to hear the Indian speaking. "It ...
— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns
... of their reserves, so far as we could see, they wished to have about two-thirds of the Province. We heard them out, and then told them it was quite clear that they had entirely misunderstood the meaning and intention of reserves. We explained the object of these in something like the language of the memorandum enclosed, and then told them it was of no use for them to entertain any such ideas, which were entirely ...
— The Treaties of Canada with The Indians of Manitoba - and the North-West Territories • Alexander Morris
... nothing, you know. I just misunderstood her. When one is always thinking of a thing everything turns itself that way. I got it into my head that she meant to hint to me that as you and Clary were fond of each other, I ought to forget it all. I ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... by his side heard the sigh, and smiled sadly at being misunderstood—but what man could understand her? They hardly spoke till they reached the Point. The waves glittered in the moonlight; there was no red light ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... grave, almost penniless, after having skirted Fortune and seen Opportunity float toward him her perfumed and intoxicating locks more than a hundred times. Bent, weary, almost forgotten, and unknown and misunderstood by the new generation, that styled this enthusiasm, more eager, moreover, than that of juvenile faith, "old"—he saw the newcomers rise as he might have beheld the ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... are often occupied in speculating upon the delicious surprises which existence may hold for you; the age, in sum, that is the most romantic and tender of all ages—for a male. I mean the age of fifty. An age absurdly misunderstood by all those who have not reached it! A thrilling age! Appearances ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... subserve the whole, while irrelevancies, however brilliant in themselves, should be cast away; and next, on the demand that great art must have for its subject the great way of living. These judgements have often been misunderstood, but the truth in them is profound and goes near to ...
— The Poetics • Aristotle
... I remember, when I was a mere child, my mother's chiding would grieve me for many days together, and I used to hear her wondering what the cause of my grief could be. She was wont then, sometimes, to call me sulky. How, sir, the characters of children are misunderstood, and how the heart, at that tender time, is trifled with, to bring remorse in after ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... precision dancers at the New Roxy Theater in New York and later the Professor had said they were going to spend the money on chorus girls. Susan had got it wrong. The Rockettes—the precision chorus girls. The Professor had said they were going to spend the money on rockets, and Susan had misunderstood. ...
— Status Quo • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... heredity and mutations. I have frequently found, from verbal or written references to my opinions, that the evidence on these questions and my own conclusions from that evidence were either imperfectly known or misunderstood. This is not surprising in view of the fact that hitherto my only publications on the hormone theory have been a paper in a German periodical and a chapter in an elementary text-book. The present publication is by no means ...
— Hormones and Heredity • J. T. Cunningham
... But Ferdy Wickersham misunderstood the other's concession. He resented the growing intimacy between Rhodes and Gordon. He had discovered that Gordon was most sensitive about the old plantation, and he used his knowledge. And when Mr. Rhodes interposed it only gave ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... pause to explain this. Had mother aproached me in a sweet and maternal manner, I would have been softened, and would have told the Whole Story. But she did not. She was, as you might say, steeming with Rage. And seeing that I was misunderstood, I hardened. I can be as hard as ...
— Bab: A Sub-Deb • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... the following slovenly sentence misunderstood: "Our object is that, with the aid of practice, we may sometime arrive at the point where we think eloquence in its most praiseworthy form to lie." "To lie" has been supposed to ...
— How to Write Clearly - Rules and Exercises on English Composition • Edwin A. Abbott
... animals I wanted, endeared him to me in a way which only a sportsman can understand. His Shansi dialect and my limited Mandarin made a curious combination of the Chinese language, but we could always piece it out with signs, and we never misunderstood each ...
— Across Mongolian Plains - A Naturalist's Account of China's 'Great Northwest' • Roy Chapman Andrews
... is sometimes expressed, Malech, and Moloch, betokens a king; as does Malecha a queen. It was a title, of old, given to many Deities in Greece; but, in after times, grew obsolete and misunderstood: whence it was often changed to [Greek: meilichos], and [Greek: meilichios], which signified the gentle, sweet, and benign Deity. Pausanias tells us that Jupiter was styled [Greek: Meilichios], both in [263]Attica ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant
... revenues were inconsiderable, and when she was in a state of absolute bankruptcy. This is considered by some as a proof that force is independent of revenue, and that Frederick the Great was mistaken in saying, that money was the sinews of war; but this case has been misunderstood as well ...
— An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations. • William Playfair
... a clearness not to be misunderstood, that in any future struggle for superiority on the ocean, the contest will be decided by the power of steam. With a view to this result, England has applied herself with even more than her wonted energy to the construction of a regular steam navy which shall be superior to all others. ...
— Ocean Steam Navigation and the Ocean Post • Thomas Rainey
... with the battle of Malvern Hill that we have to do—a battle as yet misunderstood and underrated by many who think themselves thoroughly conversant with the events of the war—one of those marvellous victories in retreat which often more fully than successes in advance illustrate the genius of those who achieve them. When the history of the War for the Union comes ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... mixture of genius and want of faith in that genius, of energy and self-distrust, of intense devotion to practical studies and the most impractical and dreamy fancy, an affectionate nature lonely and misunderstood, a spirit of the most sturdy and uncompromising independence, a mind of keen and scientific insight—a character made up, in short, of all the warring elements of philosopher, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... perhaps her religious faith; and she fancied that under Paula's influence Mary had transferred her affections from her to the younger woman with added warmth. Nor was this idea wholly fanciful; the child's strong sense of justice could not bear to see her friend misunderstood and slighted, often simply and entirely misjudged and hardly blamed, so Mary felt it her duty, as far as in her lay, to make up for her grandmother's delinquencies in regard to the guest who in ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... system we now know definitely the laws governing it. Fifty years ago much of our solar machinery was misunderstood and many things were enveloped in mystery which since has been made very plain. The spectroscope has had a wonderful part in astronomical research. It first revealed the nature of the gases existing in the sun. It next enabled us to study the prominences ...
— Marvels of Modern Science • Paul Severing
... Zooenomia, yet there is too much reason to believe that it was all along cherished by not a few private thinkers, who had imbibed the spirit of Hobbes and Priestley; and now it is beginning to speak out, in terms too unambiguous to be misunderstood, in such works as "The Purpose of Existence" and the "Letters" of Atkinson and Martineau. But apart from the opinions of individual inquirers, it must be remembered that there is a tendency in certain ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan
... "to place in a trench or hole." As the persons figured below the text appear to be planting seed by dibbling them in with a stick, this would seem to be an appropriate rendering. Dr Seler appears to have entirely misunderstood these figures, as he thinks they represent the deities pouring out water. I have in a previous part of this paper given some reasons for believing that these plates refer to the planting and ...
— Day Symbols of the Maya Year • Cyrus Thomas
... should suffer from the unworthy suspicions and prejudices of his contemporaries. His views of religious toleration were too far in advance of the age to be received with favor. They were of necessity misunderstood and misrepresented. All his life he had been urging them with the earnestness of one whose convictions were the result, not so much of human reason as of what he regarded as divine illumination. What the council of James yielded upon grounds of state policy he defended ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... This was just about one hundred years after Soto had crossed it in its lower course. On his return, he reported that he had followed the river until he came within three days of the sea. Undoubtedly he misunderstood his Indian guides. The "Great Water" of which they spoke was almost certainly the Mississippi, for that is what ...
— French Pathfinders in North America • William Henry Johnson
... seriously interfere with the contentment and industry of many families. The traditions and recollections of the many evictions which have occurred during this century have often caused the motives of the best landlords to be suspected and their most benevolent acts to be misunderstood by their tenants. The crofter system has been an extremely bad one in many respects. There cannot be much interest in making improvements where the tenant must build the houses, fences, stables, etc., but has no guarantee that he will not be turned out of his holding ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... please,' he said, as he went out from the entry to the landing on the staircase. 'I ought only to warn you: possibly some on e may have overheard us, and that our conversation may not be misunderstood and harm come of it, I shall be compelled to inform our headmaster of our conversation... in its main features. I am bound to ...
— The Wife and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... not," said Hippolita—"come, all will yet be well. Manfred, in the agony for the loss of thy brother, knew not what he said; perhaps Isabella misunderstood him; his heart is good—and, my child, thou knowest not all! There is a destiny hangs over us; the hand of Providence is stretched out; oh! could I but save thee from the wreck! Yes," continued she in a firmer tone, "perhaps the sacrifice of myself may atone for all; I will go and offer myself ...
— The Castle of Otranto • Horace Walpole
... commemorated, showing, as they do, the character of the works they performed. The writer cannot resist the temptation to refer to two of them in particular, although, doubtless, there were many others of equal merit. A reason for the preference he shows in this case, that will not be misunderstood, is the fact that one of the men was his uncle ...
— The Abolitionists - Together With Personal Memories Of The Struggle For Human Rights • John F. Hume
... Consider, moreover, how much there is, while we are in the body, to stand in the way of one mind communicating with another. We are imprisoned in the body, and our intercourse is by means of words, which feebly represent our real feelings. Hence the best motives and truest opinions are misunderstood, and the most sound rules of conduct misapplied by others. And Christians are necessarily more or less strange to each other; nay, and as far as the appearance of things is concerned, almost mislead each other, and are, as I have said, the world one to another. ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... conduct has been misrepresented, because my motives have been misunderstood. It has been assumed that I used my vast chemical resources against Anne Catherick, and that I would have used them if I could against the magnificent Marian herself. Odious insinuations both! All my ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... proof, it will be sufficient for a jury. Besides, she's a very pretty and charming girl. I suppose," he added, "Blade must have made some sort of declaration, which she, in the light of the anonymous letters, entirely misunderstood." ...
— Malcolm Sage, Detective • Herbert George Jenkins
... to myself, under correction, that all this part of the history of the Reformation has been misunderstood by our older historians. Almost without exception, they represent the Regent as dissembling with the Reformers till, on conclusion of the peace of Cateau Cambresis (which left France free to aid her efforts ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... To be misunderstood, to be blamed and pitied, to be made a pedestal for Dora's superiority, was a situation not to be contemplated. It was better to look over Dora's rudeness in the flush of Dora's pretended sorrow for it. So they forgave each other, or said they ...
— The Man Between • Amelia E. Barr
... omits the Third Shaykh's story (No. 1c) on account of its indecency, although it is really no worse than any other story in The Nights. In the story of the Fisherman, he has fallen into a very curious series of errors. He has misunderstood King Yunan's reference to King Sindbad (Burton i. p. 50) to refer to the Book of Sindibad (No. 135); and has confounded it with the story of the Forty Vazirs, which he says exists in Arabic as well as in Turkish. Of this latter, therefore, he gives an imperfect version, embedded in the story ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton
... old nobleman misunderstood the duchess-dowager when she explained the picture to him; or perhaps her grace did not choose to be quite so communicate as she could have been, and, therefore, fixed the sad event upon the gay Charley Brandon, in whose constellation ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, Issue 353, January 24, 1829 • Various
... that he found the Sicilian fishermen well acquainted with the little transparent larva (the Leptocephalus of modern naturalists), that they knew well what it was, and that they had a name for it—Casentula. Now Aristotle, in a passage which I think has been much misunderstood (and which we must admit to be in part erroneous), tells us that the eel develops from what he calls γης εντερα {gês entera}, a word which we translate, literally, the 'guts of the earth', and which commentators interpret as 'earthworms'! ...
— The Legacy of Greece • Various
... they severally impose, and both the advantages which follow the performance of those duties, and also the dangers and losses which result from the neglect of them. Insist in an especial manner on such. Commandments or other parts as seem to be most of all misunderstood or neglected by your people. It will, for example, be necessary that you should enforce with the utmost earnestness the Seventh Commandment, which treats of stealing, when you are teaching workmen, dealers and even farmers and servants, inasmuch as many of these are guilty ...
— An Explanation of Luther's Small Catechism • Joseph Stump
... no comfort then in love's defeat? Because he shall defer, For some short span of years all part in her, Submitting to forego The certain peace which happier lovers know; Because he shall be utterly disowned, Nor length of service bring Her least awakening: Foiled, frustrate and alone, misunderstood, ...
— The Poems And Prose Of Ernest Dowson • Ernest Dowson et al
... translated this description, but misunderstood what is said of the columella and is inclined to think the author did not know a diderma when he saw one; which is pretentious, to ...
— The North American Slime-Moulds • Thomas H. (Thomas Huston) MacBride
... was—even he, with all his smartness, felt that he was overcome, and that this woman was too much for him. He was altogether perplexed, as he could not perceive whether in all her tirade about the little property she had really misunderstood him, and had in truth thought that he had been talking about his uncle, or whether the whole thing was cunning on her part. The reader, perhaps, will have a more correct idea of this lady than Captain Boodle had been able to obtain. She had now risen from ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... but I must ask you to excuse me from remaining longer in the room. Mr. Forde has come a long way to see you. I think you should grant his request for a private talk with you. Good afternoon, Mr. Forde. I regret that you should have so entirely misunderstood my motives." The finality of her words robbed the disagreeable caller of a ready reply. Before he could rally a further relay of rude sarcasm to his aid, ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... Eng. trans, p. 83) that Farmer "fell into the egregious folly of speaking in a strain of impertinent conceit: it is as if the little man for little he must assuredly have been—was eaten up with vanity." This is in its way as unjust as the abuse of Knight. M. Stapfer has misunderstood Farmer's tone, which is one of banter against, not Shakspere, but those critics who blunderingly ascribed to him a wide and close knowledge of the classics. Towards Shakspere, Farmer was admiringly appreciative—and in the preface to the second edition of his essay he wrote: "Shakspere ...
— Montaigne and Shakspere • John M. Robertson
... concerned herself. As for Saracinesca, he was in a dangerous position, and was rapidly losing his self-control. He was too near to her, his heart was bearing too fast, the blood was throbbing in his temples, and he was stung by being misunderstood. ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... to Barnabas is certainly not by the Apostle of that name. Its date is much disputed, but may be safely placed within the first century. The author attempts to show the contrast between Judaism and Christianity by proving that the Jews wholly misunderstood the Mosaic law and had long since lost any claims supposed to be derived from the Mosaic covenant. The epistle is everywhere marked by hostility to Judaism, of which the writer has but imperfect knowledge. The book was regarded as Holy Scripture by Clement of Alexandria and by Origen, though ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... must have misunderstood me,' returned Miss Darrell, flushing a little. 'Gladys may have said she liked a shorter sermon in the evening, but that was hardly her reason for staying ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... Perhaps she misunderstood the reason of the chase and gave him credit for a spice of the devil in his nature. But Robert grew really desperate; he felt that the thing must be fixed up now or never, and gave his horse a ...
— Children of the Bush • Henry Lawson
... Cultivated Germany is not an anarchy, but a federation of many small states, with a much more democratic constitution than such a unified state as France, of which state Paris is the monarch. The influence of Prussia, mostly misunderstood abroad, is confined to military and civil administration; in questions of art and culture, but above all in literature, every attempt to enforce uniformity meets with the most ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... good. He placed wealth not in great possessions, but few wants. He sought to widen the domain of pleasure, and narrow that of pain, and regarded a passionless state of life the highest. Nor did he dread death, which was deliverance from misery. Epicurus has been much misunderstood, and his doctrines were subsequently perverted, especially when the arts of life were brought into the service of luxury, and a gross materialism was the great feature of society. Epicurus had much of the practical ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... of anger, a protest, and all that resounded in the silence of the studio was a merry, reckless laugh that lasted a long time, stopping occasionally, only to begin again. Then she grew pensive, with the gentle sadness of women who are "misunderstood." She was very unhappy. She could tell him everything because he was a good friend. She had married when she was still a child; a terrible mistake. There was something else in the world besides the glare of fortune, the splendor ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... two about her deil's temper as well. The truth was that the color of them changed with her emotions, but the wistfulness of them remained ever the same. Dermott, in some lines he wrote of her in Paris, described them as "corn-flowers in a mist filled with the poetry and passion of a great and misunderstood people," and though "over-poetic," as he himself said afterward, "the ...
— Katrine • Elinor Macartney Lane
... say that it was entirely free from certain disagreements. The domestic relations of great writers and poets have not always been of the rosiest. Swift did not make an ideal marriage—at least, not on conventional lines. Milton had a wife who utterly misunderstood that her husband was a genius. Dickens was not blessed with matrimonial bliss. Shelley found faith in one ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke
... I hear a woman miaouling about being misunderstood, I always want to tell her she doesn't know her luck. Wait till she marries a man who really does understand—too well. Let her see how she likes it, whenever she turns loose and gets—going a little, to have him look interested, as if he were taking notes, and begin asking questions that are—a ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... humor as a safety valve; as an escape and entire relief from the fearful exactions his endless duties put upon him. In the gravest consultations of the cabinet where he was usually a listener rather than a speaker, he would often end dispute by telling a story and none misunderstood it; and often when he was pressed to give expression on particular subjects, and his always abundant caution was baffled, he many times ended the interview by a story ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure
... letters of Percy now known to be in existence, with satisfaction and thankfulness. It is as though history were destined of set purpose to correct the fascinating misrepresentations of the poet, and to vindicate a character which has been too long misunderstood. In the fictions of our dramatic poet Hotspur is the very first to bear to Bolinbroke testimony of the reckless, dissolute habits of Henry of Monmouth.[106] Hotspur is the very first whom the truth of history declares to have given direct and ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... the great triumvir, that a strength of coloring should survive in his character, capable of baffling the wrongs and ravages of time. Neither is it to be thought strange that a character should have been misunderstood and falsely appreciated for nearly two thousand years. It happens not uncommonly, especially amongst an unimaginative people like the Romans, that the characters of men are ciphers and enigmas to their own age, and are first read and interpreted by a far distant posterity. Stars are ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... world?—-she only looked so pathetic that people all rushed to comfort her, if possible by means of kissing. It was more than tiresome, it was maddening. Nature was determined that she should look and sound angelic. She could never be disagreeable or rude without being completely misunderstood. ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim
... unmerited misfortunes to fall into the hands of vice. It was during this period of her life that she won a friendship quite as strong and quite as precious as that of old Grossetete. She became the beloved lamb of a distinguished priest, who was persecuted for his true merits, which were wholly misunderstood, one of the two grand-vicars of the ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac
... a very great presumption that the peculiar doctrines of Mr. Newman and his friends, those which they make it their professed business to inculcate, are not of God. I am anxious not to be misunderstood in saying this. Mr. Newman and his friends preach many doctrines which are entirely of God; as Christians, as ministers of Christ's Church, they preach God's word; and thus, a very large portion of their teaching is ...
— The Christian Life - Its Course, Its Hindrances, And Its Helps • Thomas Arnold
... for years if he found them in an open plain are here mingled and confounded; but it is not a darkness of deformity. It is a darkness of life; a darkness of perfection. And I began to think how much of the highest human obscurity is like this, and how much men have misunderstood it. People will tell you, for instance, that theology became elaborate because it was dead. Believe me, if it had been dead it would never have become elaborate; it is only the live tree that grows ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton
... had come to his knocking and tired with the excitement of the day, fearful, too, at the thought of the lonely walk which now awaited him, he chose to believe that mayhap he had either misunderstood his master's orders, or that Sir Marmaduke himself had been mistaken when he thought the mistress ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy
... eluded my own grasp." And almost his latest moment of consciousness had been pervaded by a faint thrill of pleased pride at the turn of the sentence as he read it over. This high style was not, however, maintained throughout, and the purport could not be misunderstood. Furthermore, everybody knew that he had said he had not a relation belonging to him in this world; and that being so, it was natural enough for him to make a promising and favorite pupil his heir. At first sight, therefore, no difficulties ...
— Strangers at Lisconnel • Barlow Jane
... from meaning and purpose from purpose. It generates in the mind, for each vulgar observation, a whole brood of suggestions, hypotheses, and inferences. The sciences bestow, as is right and fitting, infinite pains upon that experience which in their absence would drift by unchallenged or misunderstood. They take note, infer, and prophesy. They compare prophecy with event; and altogether they supply—so intent are they on reality—every imaginable background and ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... class, men and women, are charming without being dangerous. They love the society of the other sex; they have the art of pleasing and make use of it, but they play the game fairly. There is no poaching, no snares are laid for the unwary, and if harm is done it is because people have misunderstood them. The man flirts because he loves {38} to say pretty things to a woman. He revels in an interchange of banter and repartee which makes her eyes sparkle and his pulses beat the faster. The girl flirts out of the abundance of her joyous vitality. ...
— The Etiquette of Engagement and Marriage • G. R. M. Devereux
... that feeling was suspended in him, but that it was compressed. It was his natural response to any opposition which his reasonings could not shake nor his will overcome, and which, rightly or not, conveyed to him the sense of being misunderstood. It reacted in pain for others, but it lay with an aching weight on his own heart, and was thrown off in an upheaval of the pent-up kindliness and affection, the moment their true springs were touched. The hardening power in his ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... God, our heavenly Father, meets with the same reward," said Jordan, with a painful smile. "God and the king are the two powers most misunderstood. In their bright radiance they stand too high above the sons of men: they demand of the king that he shall be all-wise, almighty, even as God is; they require of God that He shall judge and act as weak, short-sighted men do, not 'knowing the end ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... with what Mr. Gregory said; about Eddie he looked a little grave, and puckered up his forehead for full five minutes, as Mr. Clair described his restlessness, discontent, and want of application, and, worst of all, the foolish idea that he was really very clever, and very much misunderstood and unappreciated ...
— Little Folks (October 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... everything," she continued, "you would not be so obstinate. If Beatrice herself were here, if I could whisper something in her ear, she would be only too thankful that I had found her out. Beatrice has always misunderstood me, Mr. Tavernake. It is a little hard upon me, for we are both so far away from home, ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... "You misunderstood me, Marian. I neither boasted, nor threatened, nor taunted. I have even apologized for that moment's irritation. If you cannot forgive such a trifle, you yourself ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... "You misunderstood me," she said, pale and with flashing eyes, and in such a struggle with her emotions that ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... every one about him, while here is another who, because he is so fast, is continually injuring the feelings of others. Here is a person naturally so impatient that at times he wounds and hurts others. The intentions of these persons are often misunderstood, and mistakes arise from the misunderstanding. We, thinking that certain things were done or said for certain purposes, may do and say certain things. Later we discover some other course would ...
— Adventures in the Land of Canaan • Robert Lee Berry
... of my Government during the whole course of this controversy have been misunderstood or not properly appreciated, and the question is daily changing its character. A negotiation entered into for procuring compensation to individuals involved no positive obligation on their Governments to prosecute it to extremities. A ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson
... fact that he is a Puritan, while Shakespeare was spiritually a Catholic. The former is always screwing himself up to see truth; the latter is often content that truth is there. The Puritan is only strong enough to stiffen; the Catholic is strong enough to relax. Shaw, I think, has entirely misunderstood the pessimistic passages of Shakespeare. They are flying moods which a man with a fixed faith can afford to entertain. That all is vanity, that life is dust and love is ashes, these are frivolities, these are jokes that a Catholic can afford to utter. He knows well enough ...
— George Bernard Shaw • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... was in a great hurry to talk to Jane about Madeline. I knew that she would sympathise with me. I had not written home a word about her, for I knew that it would never do to say that I had fallen in love with the daughter of a rebel, as my feelings and motives and reasons would not fail to be misunderstood. I thought that I would first interest Jane, and then that we could win over my mother to listen to what we had to say, and then that my father would easily be brought round. Of course I knew that two important events must occur before anything I could say ...
— Hurricane Hurry • W.H.G. Kingston
... foreign members and I was once a member as Berlioz's successor on Liszt's own invitation. Disagreements separated us, and I had had no relation with the society for a number of years when they asked me to take part in this festival. A refusal would have been misunderstood and I had to accept, although the idea of performing at my age alongside such virtuosi as Risler, Busoni, and Friedheim, in the height of their talent, was ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... perversity; therefore he gave himself up to despair, a disillusioned man. Then he fell in love with a girl who married somebody else. He complained of her conduct to his friends, male and female, but they only laughed at him. For a little while longer he trod his solitary path alone and misunderstood. He belonged to "society," and joined in its pursuits, because it distracted him; but at the bottom of his heart he had nothing but contempt for its amusements, which he ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... glad old days, before the rise of modern morbidities, when genial old Ibsen filled the world with wholesome joy, and the kindly tales of the forgotten Emile Zola kept our firesides merry and pure, it used to be thought a disadvantage to be misunderstood. It may be doubted whether it is always or even generally a disadvantage. The man who is misunderstood has always this advantage over his enemies, that they do not know his weak point or his plan of campaign. They go out against a bird with nets ...
— Heretics • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... Whenever you go out of doors, draw the chin in, carry the crown of your head high, and fill the lungs to the utmost; drink in sunshine; greet your friends with a smile, and put soul into every hand-clasp. Do not fear being misunderstood and never waste a minute thinking about your enemies. Try to fix firmly in your mind what you would like to do, and then without violence of direction you will move straight to ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... the exertions of our fathers, and the forces which their work set in motion for our benefit, have brought us, we see down into the valley, along the rugged way we have come, abundant reason why men often misunderstood each other—they could not see each other in any true and just light. But just as the heavy material roadway along which the old locomotion was shifting a hundred years ago, from horses' backs on to wheels, has become firmer, broader, lighter, and freer ...
— Fragments of Two Centuries - Glimpses of Country Life when George III. was King • Alfred Kingston
... may be kept. My dependence, therefore, is on the Admiralty demanding me to be given up, by virtue of the French passport, in which, even here it is acknowledged, there has been no infringement on my part further than in intention, which intention has been misconstrued and misunderstood by a man violent against the name of an Englishman, and ignorant of what ...
— The Naval Pioneers of Australia • Louis Becke and Walter Jeffery
... he strengthens himself in his castle.[2] Then the Bishop remains victor in the town, and forms a government of rich and noble burghers, who control with him the fortunes of the new-born state. At this crisis we begin to hear for the first time a word that has been much misunderstood. The Popolo appears upon the scene. Interpreting the past by the present, and importing the connotation gained by the word people in the revolutions of the last two centuries, students are apt to assume that the Popolo of the Italian burghs included the whole population. In reality ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... there. He putting the ocean between him and Pattaquasset? he setting out for the Old World, with all his hopes just blossoming in the New? What could be the explanation? Was it possible, Dr. Harrison asked himself for one moment, that he could have been mistaken? that he could have misunderstood the issue of the conversation that morning in Faith's sick room? A moment resolved him. He recalled the steady, dauntless look of Faith's eyes after his words,—a look which he had two or three times been privileged to receive from her and never cared ...
— Say and Seal, Volume II • Susan Warner |
