"Nonsense" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "It's all nonsense about ghosts. I've slept here twenty times, Penelope. People have seen my light and my shadow, that's all. ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... enjoyed the practice of her brother, who spoke the previous evening, he said: "But of course Mrs. Hooker couldn't vote, nor be a member of the legislature, or even a justice of the peace. Insufferable nonsense! If such women don't vote before I die—well, like Gough's obstinate deacon, I won't die till ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... "Nonsense, Jenny; I can't help it if I would. Do you think I should enjoy dancing, if I knew you were sitting alone in this dark corner, while grandpapa and Aunt Agnes are playing chess! You are looking a great deal more woe-begone than you ought to, now ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... conversation, and the pride arising from finding myself admitted as his companion, produced a variety of sensations and a pleasing elevation of mind beyond what I had ever before experienced." That memorable evening Johnson ridiculed Colley Cibber's birthday odes and Paul Whitehead's "grand nonsense," and ran down Gray, who had declined his acquaintance. He talked of other poets, and praised poor Goldsmith as a worthy man and excellent author. Boswell fairly won the great man by his frank avowals and his adroit flattery. "Give me your hand," ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... what they do. That is the only thing a negro cares about, to go to sleep in the sun. It's all nonsense, Daisy." ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... nonsense, which he knew to be such, even while imagining it, but whose imaginary flavor was very pleasant to him, all ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... fresh," said Harry. "Never mind; jump up, Phil, and we'll soon take a little of his nonsense ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn
... friends," said Dillon. "We'll gain by it exactly what you Earth people gained when you traded freely among yourselves, before blocked currencies and quotas and such nonsense strangled trade. We'll gain what you gained when you'd stopped having every city a fort and every village guarded by the castle of its lord. Look, Coburn: we've got people inside the Iron Curtain. We'll keep them there. You won't be able ...
— The Invaders • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... "Nonsense! no. I didn't say baskets would, did I?" returned Jennie, who still held her own dangling from her arm. "Yours was a perfect beauty, Dot. What a ...
— Dotty Dimple at Her Grandmother's • Sophie May
... to himself, or treated after any other method of the drug-system. Let the food be plain, and the patient will scarcely ever eat too much. To stimulate his appetite by constantly asking him whether he would not like this or that, is sheer nonsense; and to satisfy his whims, against our ...
— Hydriatic treatment of Scarlet Fever in its Different Forms • Charles Munde
... had selected some cloth for trousers undeterred by his tailor's timid remonstrance of "Not quite your usual taste, sir." The result was that the Under-Secretary to Government startled official Calcutta by appearing in brilliant claret-coloured raiment. Baker remonstrated: "Claret-colour! Nonsense, my trousers are silver grey," said Yule, and entirely declined to be convinced. "I think I did convince him at last," said Baker with some pride, when long after telling the story to the present writer. "And then he gave them up?" "Oh, no," said Sir William ruefully, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... yet I fancied there was something which seemed not utterly unfamiliar to me in the expression of his face. Vernor! Vernor! I don't believe I ever heard the name before—it's very odd. Of course, what he says about Miss Saville is all nonsense; and yet there was something in her manner, which made me fancy, if I had time and opportunity—pshaw! what absurdity—I shall have enough to do if I am to imagine myself in love with every nice girl who ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... a youngster without theories. The point is, of what follows, how much, if any, was a dream? Where were the partition lines between sleep and waking,—between what we call Certainty, and—the other thing? Or else, by a freak of nature, might a man live so long—Nonsense!—Never mind; ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... an old soldier I admit the cowardice: it's as universal as sea sickness, and matters just as little. But that about putting an idea into a man's head is stuff and nonsense. In a battle all you need to make you fight is a little hot blood and the knowledge that it's more dangerous ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... thanks to the glorious institution of sleep, comes a break in the narrative again. These absurd young people are safely tucked away now, their heads full of glowing nonsense, indeed, but the course of events at any rate is safe from any fresh developments through their activities for the next eight hours or more. They are both sleeping healthily you will perhaps be astonished ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... in your opposition, my good fellow; I will sound the King's real feelings, and humor him accordingly. [Aloud]. The blockhead talks nonsense, and your Majesty, in your own person, furnishes the best proof of it. Observe, Sire, the advantage and pleasure the hunter derives from the chase. Freed from all grosser influences, his frame Loses its sluggish humors, and becomes Buoyant, compact, and fit ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... him, because mothers have to agree with fathers, and not because it was her own idea) that children who coated a carpet on both sides with thick mud, and when they were asked for an explanation could only talk silly nonsense—that meant Jane's truthful statement—were not fit to have a carpet at all, and, indeed, SHOULDN'T have one ...
— The Phoenix and the Carpet • E. Nesbit
... 'Nonsense, child,' said Miss Mildmay, impatiently. 'I cannot begin things of that kind, as you might understand. You have companionship at school, and when you are at home you must be content with your own society. ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... skimming miraculously over short bright waves. The air, too, seemed to break in waves against her, sweeping by on its current all the slanted lights and moist sharp perfumes of the failing day. She panted to herself: "This is nonsense!" her blood hummed back: "But it's glorious!" and she sped on till she saw that Owen had caught sight of her and was striding ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... usual brilliancy, and also the" &c. "Sartor Resartus is what old Dennis used to call 'a heap of clotted nonsense,' mixed however, here and there, with passages marked by thought and striking poetic vigour. But what does the writer mean by 'Baphometic fire-baptism'? Why cannot he lay aside his pedantry, and write so as to ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... "Nonsense! What's the matter with me this morning?" and he shrugged impatiently. "I don't know anybody named 'Hugh Gordon' and there's nobody in here anyway. The sound must have come from the hall, or, maybe, from ...
— The Fate of Felix Brand • Florence Finch Kelly
... all this trouble and nonsense about," the General asked, looking first at the girl and then at Alf. "'Od zounds, there oughtn't to be any trouble about a chair. Fifty of ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read
... its being so considered, the author tautologically repeats what he had said immediately before, "the same was in the beginning with God." Upon the supposition that the Logos is strictly identical with God, the verses make utter nonsense. "In the beginning was God, and God was with God, and God was God. God was in the beginning with God." But suppose the Logos to mean an ante mundane but subordinate being, who was a perfect image or likeness of God, and the sense is both clear and satisfactory, and ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... "All nonsense!" said Troy, angrily. "There she is with plenty of money, and a house and farm, and horses, and comfort, and here am I living from hand to mouth—a needy adventurer. Besides, it is no use talking now; ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... she understood their meaning,—the meaning in which he must necessarily take them,—and she blushed up to her forehead. Then she laughed as she strove to recall the encouragement she had given him. "You know what I mean, Mr. Moggs. I don't mean any silly nonsense ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... view, scrap-books are the death of love. Many a very sensible man can "whisper soft nonsense in a lady's ear," when all the circumstances of the scene are congenial. We ourselves have frequently descended to make ourselves merely the most agreeable man in the world, till we unfortunately discovered that the blockheads who could not comprehend us when ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... eclipse information in the following words:—"I have not cited one half of Ricciolus's list of portentous eclipses, and for the same reason that he declines giving any more of them than what that list contains, namely, that 'tis most disagreeable to dwell any longer on such nonsense, and as much as possible to avoid tiring the reader. The superstition of the ancients may be seen by the few here copied. My author further says that there were treatises written to show against what regions ...
— The Story of Eclipses • George Chambers
... foreign critics grounded their strictures "upon the tales of some miserable reptiles who, after having abused the hospitality and patience of this country, levy a tax from their own by disseminating a vile mass of falsehood and nonsense under the denomination of Travels through the ...
— The Philadelphia Magazines and their Contributors 1741-1850 • Albert Smyth
... about their relation. Their common life is developed, and they value each other for individual qualities. I have never found an exception to the statement by teachers of mixed schools, that there is less of nonsense, less of false sentimentality and precocious sexual attraction, than where the boys and girls ...
— The Education of American Girls • Anna Callender Brackett
... was early upon the ground. He had quite slept off what he would have called the nonsense of last night, and was very keen upon settlements, consols, mortgages, jointures, and all ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... would be thankful and glad to have silk stockings. Nonsense, your legs are warm enough. I don't believe you. Now, Richard, how perfectly ridiculous! There is no left or right to stockings. You have no time to change. Shoes are a different thing. Well, hurry up, then. Because they are made so, I suppose. ...
— The Speaker, No. 5: Volume II, Issue 1 - December, 1906. • Various
... 'Tell father that's nonsense,' Simon wrote back. 'The worst individuals we have to deal with come from a Boer mother and an English father, deposited here by the ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... the reviewing stand refrained from any hilarity until they saw the float that four of the ants were pulling behind them. It was in keeping with the rest of the nonsense they were perpetrating. The float boasted eight larger ray guns, three on either side and two in the rear, that fired the same fascinating blue sparks. Behind each gun an ant stood on its head, wildly waving six legs in the breeze, begging to ...
— Martian V.F.W. • G.L. Vandenburg
... little book I wrote for thee Thy friendly eyes will never see. It was not meant for critics' reading, Nor for the world that scans unheeding. For there are lines washed in with tears, As well as nonsense, mocking fears. Alas! thine eyes will never see This little book I ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... this ship proves to be a wreck, as I more than suspect is the case, there will be no more spoiling for you, and I'll see if I cannot make something like a man of you. Now, just turn that saying over in your mind, and don't let me have any more of your nonsense. Now we will go and see what can be done for your ...
— The First Mate - The Story of a Strange Cruise • Harry Collingwood
... 'Nonsense, Lord Chizelrigg. Put your application in motion, if you like. Meanwhile I beg of you to look upon me as a more substantial banker than your old steward. Let us enjoy a good dinner together at the Cecil tonight, if you will do me the honour to be my guest. Tomorrow we can leave for Chizelrigg Chase. ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... "That's nonsense. Everyone in the county knows Cat-Eye Mose. He wouldn't hurt a fly. If he was present at the time of the crime it was to help his master, and the man who killed Colonel Gaylord killed him too. I've known him all my life and I can ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster
... to her curt and rather unfeeling about the whole thing, insisting, somewhat indelicately, she thought, on the point that Ann be prepared to earn her own living and that there be no more nonsense about her. She hoped he was kinder with Ann than he sounded in his letters ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell
... in any such newfangled nonsense. It ain't none of a parson's business what the community does. You're hired, ain't you, an' paid to run the church? That's the end of it. We ain't goin' to have any mixin' of religion an' ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker
... wid a good massa and missy. Dey not work so hard as de white man. Dey have plenty to eat and drink, dey hab deir gardens and deir fowls. When dey are sick dey are taken care ob, when dey are ole they are looked after and hab nothing to do. I have heard people talk a lot of nonsense about de hard life of de plantation slabe. Dat not true, sar, wid a good massa. De slabe hab no care and he bery happy. If all massas were good, and dere were a law dat if a plantation were broken up de slabes ...
— By Sheer Pluck - A Tale of the Ashanti War • G. A. Henty
... "Stuff and nonsense, my dear, remember your dependent position, and the advantages this match holds out to you. You must not think or talk of delay. He will be here to-morrow, and I hope his lover eloquence will soon decide ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... "Cease your nonsense, you blubbering fool! A precious creature you are to take on yourself to marry any man! Are you going to answer me, Anty?" And he walked away from the fire, and came and stood opposite to her as she sat upon the sofa. "Are you ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope
... heavens!" The man laughed. "I do mean it, every word! When we were having tea just now I did a lot of thinking. I am a man who makes up his mind quickly and sticks to it. Now, look here, I'm going to make you an offer—without sentiment or any nonsense of that sort. I want a wife, and I want a girl who hasn't been spoilt by the tomfoolery of the world. I want a girl I can mould to my own ideas. I'll treat her well and be a good husband to a woman who could fancy me." He paused. "Well, ...
— The Beggar Man • Ruby Mildred Ayres
... pitifullest thing in life to see this unhappy, unfriended creature staggering, and dancing, and talking he knew not what. Some of the men laughed, but not all; others would grow as black as thunder (thinking, perhaps, of their own childhood or their own children) and bid him stop that nonsense, and think what he was doing. As for me, I felt ashamed to look at him, and the poor child still comes about me ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Irving's production of "Romeo and Juliet" has been attributed to my ambition. What nonsense! Henry Irving now had in view the production of all Shakespeare's actable plays, and naturally "Romeo and Juliet" would come as early as ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... nonsense. It is our Masters who affirm it [my italics]. If the history of Jehoshua or Jesus Ben Pandera is false, then the whole of the Talmud, the whole of the Jewish canon law, is false. It was the disciple of Jehoshua Ben ...
— Secret Societies And Subversive Movements • Nesta H. Webster
... full of meat and mischief as a lion-cub." He turned again. "Knapp," he said solemnly, "this is your officer. He's coming with you to see you off. He carries the King's commission as truly as I do. You'll obey him as you would me, and no nonsense, d'you see?" ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... likely to pursue that unfortunate woman. There could be no mistake about it; he knew it; he knew it by many subtle and infallible signs. Somewhere he had heard or read that no nice man ever knows these things. That was all nonsense; or, if it had any meaning at all, it could only mean that no nice man ever shows that he knows. The fact remained that if he had loved her he ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... "Nonsense," said Mr. Boyce testily. "They got along in your Uncle Robert's days, and they can get along now. Charity, indeed! Why, the state of this house and the pinch for money altogether is enough, I should think, to take a man's mind. Don't you go talking to Mr. Harden in the way you do, Marcella. ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... burned their wings and feet With the sides of the smoking pot. He laughed, "Oh, nonsense! Now, my dears, ...
— Merry Words for Merry Children • A. Hoatson
... Jack? Nonsense, Miss Anne is far too good and obedient to do such a wild thing, knowing how it would displease ...
— The Girls and I - A Veracious History • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... "Nonsense?" And as he spoke he took her by the arm and shook her. He shook her violently so that he hurt her, and her breath for a moment was all but gone from her. "I tell you you must make dollars before I leave you, or I will so handle you that it would have been better for you ...
— Aaron Trow • Anthony Trollope
... the cabman in tones of unfeigned disgust, "you are green ones after all! He'd have charged a bob a piece for the traps, and landed you up to eight bob, and stood no nonsense too about it. Come, settle up, young gentlemen, please. The Templeton boys I'm used to always fork ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... defects which take root only in masterpieces; it is given only to certain geniuses to have certain defects. Shakespeare is blamed for his abuse of metaphysics, of wit, of redundant scenes, of obscenities, for his employment of the mythological nonsense in vogue in his time, for exaggeration, obscurity, bad taste, bombast, asperities of style. The oak, that giant tree which we were comparing to Shakespeare just now, and which has more than one point of resemblance to him, ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... it is foolish. Wisdom never kicks at the iron walls it can't bring down," she said. "But we are cursed. Waldo, born cursed from the time our mothers bring us into the world till the shrouds are put on us. Do not look at me as though I were talking nonsense. Everything has two sides—the outside that is ridiculous, and ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner
... it all?" he asked, soothingly. "I don't think the silly nonsense of the servants need trouble you. John is a sad fellow, I know; he courts all the pretty colored girls wherever he goes. I shall have to read him a serious lecture on the subject. But it is very kind of you to ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... note slowly in his hand till it was nothing more than a crumpled ball of paper, and raised his arm to fling it away. Then suddenly his lips relaxed in a smile and a light of relief sprang into his eyes. It was all nonsense, of course—just some foolish, woman's whim or fancy, some ridiculous idea she had got into her head which five minutes' talk between them would dispel. He had been a fool to take it seriously. He unclenched ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... education which does not at the same time seek to teach duty—duty to oneself, to the state, to humanity at large—is no real education at all. But in the world in which we live at present, a sense of duty is regarded as nonsense. Labour does not realise its duties, neither does wealth; neither does the Church, except to churchmen; nor Parliament, except to the party which provides its funds. And yet, as I said before, a sense of duty is the very foundation ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King
... (supposition) 514. sophistry, paralogy[obs3], perversion, casuistry, jesuitry, equivocation, evasion; chicane, chicanery; quiddet[obs3], quiddity; mystification; special pleading; speciousness &c. adj.; nonsense &c. 497; word sense, tongue sense. false reasoning, vicious reasoning, circular reasoning; petitio principii[Lat], ignoratio elenchi[Lat]; post hoc ergo propter hoc[Lat]; non sequitur, ignotum per ignotius[Lat]. misjudgment &c. 481; false teaching &c. 538. sophism, solecism, paralogism[obs3]; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... fancy that a Line of Nonsense will catch you before you leave Ely: and yet, now I come to think, you will have left Ely, probably, and will be returning in another Fortnight to Cambridge for the Term. Well, I will direct to Cambridge then; and my Note shall await ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes - Vol. II • Edward FitzGerald
... "Nonsense, Horner!" said I, interrupting him; "what a mess you are making of it! I said one lady was middle-aged; ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... that I am nothing to you. Only embodied selfishness and callousness could say that. You may not be able to give what I do, but you should give all you can. 'Rivers of blood flowing between us' is morbid nonsense. Forgive me that I speak strongly,—I feel strongly. My soul is in my words. I felt towards my cause as you towards yours, and had I not acted as I have, you would be the first to think me a craven. But what has all this to do with the sacred ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... her charms into old age. As was inevitable to such a dominant personality she made enemies, who resented her airs and scoffed at her graces. Lady Granville called her "a tiresome, quarrelsome woman"; the Duke of Wellington, one of her most abject slaves, once exclaimed, "What —— nonsense Lady Jersey talks!" and Granville declared that she had "neither wit, nor imagination, nor humour." But to the last day of her long life she retained the homage and admiration of hundreds, over whom she cast the spell of her ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... "Nonsense!" said she; and in spite of their assurances and entreaties, she marched straight towards the door through which the captain saw ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... judiciously, that the soldiers assembling for Mazarin upon the frontiers would laugh at all the decrees of Parliament unless they were proclaimed to them by good musketeers and pikemen, was run down as if he had talked nonsense, and all the clamour was that it belonged only to ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... "Nonsense! Jack in love with some half-breed—that dusky beauty in breeches who rides astride, and whom he happened to mention ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown
... Opus Imperfectum falsely ascribed to St. John Chrysostom] says: "If there is a reason for swearing, it seems a small thing to swear by God, but a great thing to swear by the Gospels. To those who think thus, it must be said: Nonsense! the Scriptures were made for God's sake, not God for the sake of the Scriptures." Now men of all conditions and at all times are wont to swear by God. Much more, therefore, is it lawful ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... windows to let the light in, and you want curtains to keep it out; we've plastered the walls to make them white, and now you want to paste blue paper over them; we've waxed floors to walk on, and we must pay two dollars a yard for a carpet to save the oak plank! Begone with your nonsense, ye ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... carving-knife. No more fitting author could be found. They would give their pamphlet to the world as her work, edited by an admiring nephew. The printer appreciated the joke no less than the authors of it. He provided splendid paper and magnificent type; and before long the book of nonsense was in the hands of Oxford readers. It sold for the high price of half-a-crown a copy; and, what is hardly credible, the gownsmen received it as a genuine production. "It was indeed a kind of fashion to be seen reading it in public, as a mark of nice discernment, of a delicate ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... would be a needless trouble; as soon as I began to speak to him of solar powder and aerial genii he would start: "Jacques Tournebroche, remember, my boy, that you must never put faith in absurdities, but bring home to your reason all matters except those of our holy religion. Stuff and nonsense all these globes and powders, with all the other follies of the cabala and the ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... "It isn't nonsense!" exclaimed Olga, flushing angrily. "Why do you come to interfere with me? What right have you, Irene? I'm old enough to live as I please. I don't ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... afraid you will begin to talk nonsense, and make him lose the good opinion he seems to ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... nonsense! billet-doux indeed! more likely a bill from Duke the tailor. Excuse me for a moment, my dear. Follow me, sir," and rising, still with shirtsleeves uncovered, he quitted the room, closing the door after him, motioned Kenelm into ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... is unto the foulest pen, Or fairest handled by the sons of men. 'Twill also show what is upon it writ, Be it wisely, or nonsense for want of wit, Each blot and blur it also will expose To thy next readers, be ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... hand on Madelon's shoulder. "Now you look at here, gal," said he. "I've had about all this darned nonsense I'm a-goin' to stan'. That chap is in jail for murder, an' in jail he's a-goin' to stay till I git orders from somebody besides you to let him out. An' what's more, don't you come here on no sich tom-fool arrant agin. If you do you won't git in. I ain't no objection ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... An angel! Nonsense! Everybody so describes his mistress; and yet I find it impossible to tell you how perfect she is, or why she is so perfect: suffice it to say she ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe
... initiative must intervene, and men of goodwill must organize internationally for this humane work!" What mockery would not have met the man who would have dared to speak thus! To begin with, he would have been called a Utopian, and if that did not silence him he would have been told: "What nonsense! Your volunteers will be found wanting precisely where they are most needed, your volunteer hospitals will be centralized in a safe place, while everything will be wanting in the ambulances. Utopians ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin
... for admiration and to be listened to, and accordingly the least interruption puts him out. I firmly believe he would make just the same impression on half his audiences, if he purposely repeated absolute nonsense with the same voice and manner and inexhaustible flow of undulating speech! In general, wit shines only by reflection. You must take your cue from your company—must rise as they rise, and sink as they fall. You must see that your good things, your knowing allusions, are ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... you will permit me to share your bundle of pelts, I believe I can prove to you that it is not such arrant nonsense, after all." ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... then split up into groups, lingering here and there to discuss my statements as they moved toward the door; and M'Allister told me that, as he stood near a group, he heard one man exclaim, "It's all arrant nonsense! five minutes with my 12-1/16-inch reflector would convince any sane man that there are no fine lines to be seen on Mars, because none exist!" This brought a murmur of assent; then some one else said, "Well, I certainly see some of the lines with my 7-1/2-inch, ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks
... it! Talk, do, chatter some nonsense, else I'll think: And then I'm feeling like a grub that crawls All abroad in a dusty road; and high Above me, and shaking the ground beneath me, come Wheels of a thundering wain, ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... I would have termed nonsense a month ago," replied Sykes, "but now—well, I am afraid you are right. And," he said slowly, "I fear that they are equally correct. They have conquered space; they have ships propelled by some unknown power; they have gas weapons, as you ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... "All nonsense," said Sartoris hoarsely. "You are overstrung, and your imagination is too real for you. Did any of the rest of you hear ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... "Nonsense!" said his friend; "do we not all know to what a termagant you are united? and her temper and high rank combined must no doubt make her a sweet companion." Here he burst into a loud laugh, and the little man actually strutted with a feeling ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... whether she would be afraid. But Friday evening the boys were full of it, and Steve said it was nonsense. She crept up into her father's lap and asked him in a tremulous ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas
... gossiped a night or two"—such is the conclusion of his Christmas letter of 1893, when Page was thirty-eight, with a growing family of his own—"till I've filled the paper—all such little news and less nonsense as most gossip and most letters are made of. But it is for you to read between the lines. That's where the love lies, dear mother. I wish you were here Christmas; we should welcome you as nobody else in the world can be welcomed. But wherever you are and though all the rest have the joy of seeing ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... round turn by tellin' all hands what you'd said. Says I: 'Now look here, you chaps. We've got the navigator we wants, and if this here treasure place is to be found you may all bet your boots he'll find it. But he won't have no socialism, no runnin' the ship by committees, nor no nonsense of that sort; he'll be Mister Skipper, and don't none of you forget it! Now, you was all quite satisfied when Cap'n Stenson commanded the ship: what difference do it make to any of you whether it's Stenson or Mr Blackburn what gives the orders? It don't make a hap'orth of difference to e'er a one ...
— The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn • Harry Collingwood
... friends be afraid of it. A good deal of nonsense is talked (by meat-eaters I mean, of course) about the properties of food, and they would have us believe that they eat a beef-steak mainly because it contains 21.5 per cent. of nitrogen. But we know better. They ...
— New Vegetarian Dishes • Mrs. Bowdich
... nonsense!' exclaimed the marquis. 'Thinkest though the roundhead would have let thee run to Rupert? It was not to that end he spared thy life. Thy only chance ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... artillery officer, applied to General Twiggs, from whose command part of the expedition was making up, for leave to take a little box of military books. "No, sir," was the peremptory response; "no room in the train for such nonsense." Hunt retired chop-fallen; but soon after another officer came in, with "General, our mess has a keg of very nice whiskey we don't want to lose; won't you direct the quartermaster to let it go in the wagons?" "Oh ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... shapely, well-shod foot petulantly. "Rubbish!" she exclaimed. "You don't suppose I believe that nonsense, do you?" ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... "Nonsense, Benny!" Miss Maggie crossed to a little stand and picked up a small box. "Here's a new picture puzzle. See if you ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter
... what nonsense! cried the impatient gentleman, snatching the packet from her hand; there is no such office in the county. Eh! what! it is, I declare, a commission, appointing Richard Jones, Esquire, sheriff of the county. Well, this is kind in Duke, positively. ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... himself had begun to perceive, but he did not put it pleasantly. Deucedly clever girl as she was, he said to himself, she saw that it would be more agreeable to have no nonsense talked, and no ruffling of tempers. He had always been able to convey to people that the ruffling of his temper was a thing to be avoided, and perhaps she had already been sharp enough to realise this was a fact to be counted with. She was sharp enough, he said to himself, ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... discount in comparison with gold. Though the Bank directors of that day at last fell into errors, yet on the whole they acted with singular judgment and moderation. But when, in 1810, they came to be examined as to their reasons, they gave answers that have become almost classical by their nonsense. Mr. Pearse, the Governor of the Bank, said: 'In considering this subject, with reference to the manner in which bank-notes are issued, resulting from the applications made for discounts to supply the necessary ...
— Lombard Street: A Description of the Money Market • Walter Bagehot
... out of logs standing upright. It was only a hut, you see; no laths, nor plaster, nor any such nonsense. Well, Joe knew by what he heard that old man Brown was inside, firing from the door at the Indians; didn't know where the other two were,—killed, may be,—and so Joe gets up on his knees and looks through a crevice of the stockade wall, and sees the chief crawling stealthily around the ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... yourself. Test him a little. If you and I weren't the greatest pals I shouldn't be such an ass as to talk in this strain to you. But I know you won't misunderstand me. I know you know there's absolutely no conventional nonsense about me, just as I know there's absolutely no conventional nonsense about you. I'm perfectly aware that the old can't teach the young, and that oftener than not the young are right and the old wrong. But it's not a question of old and young between you and me. ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... of Colonel Thorneycroft in withdrawing raises also the mooted question of when and how the assumption of responsibility in disobeying orders—express or implied, general or particular—is to be justified; a matter on which much unenlightened nonsense has lately been spoken and written in the United States. No general rule, {p.264} indeed, can be laid down, but this much may surely be re-affirmed—that the justification of so serious a step must ever rest, not on the officer's opinion ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan
... of Arthur Murphy[R] and David Erskine Baker[S]. A tragedy, called Zingis, written by Alexander Dow, was so totally unintelligible that the audience were continually asking each other—What is it about? What is it about?—That such nonsense should be written is not so very marvellous, as that the miserable farrago should have had a run of nine nights, which has been frequently denied to works ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... Protestant women nurses arrived at Alexandria, where they were made unwelcome. Medical directors, surgeons, ward masters objected, bluntly declaring that they wouldn't endure a lot of women interfering and fussing and writing hysterical nonsense to ...
— Ailsa Paige • Robert W. Chambers
... could see that she was, but at the same time completely and eternally outside her husband's spiritual life. That might have been perhaps in the first place by her own desire—she did not want "to be bothered with all that nonsense." But certainly all these years with him had worked upon her: she was not perhaps so sure now that it was all "nonsense." She wanted, it might be, a closer alliance with him, which she could not have because ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... the old maid. "Are you going to pour out all your nonsense once more about poetry and the arts, and to crack your fingers and stretch your arms while you spout about the ideal, and beauty, and all your northern madness?—Beauty is not to compare with solid pudding —and what am I!—You have ideas in your ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... far as the rick-yard hedge. You children talk such nonsense. Jack ran away of his own free-will, and out of downright contrariness. He has repented of it only once, I dare say, and that has been ever since he did it, and every time he thought of it. I wish he was home again, with all my heart, for I can ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... right, then," he agreed. "If it's any consolation doing a fool's trick like that, why do it! Now come along, and let's get inside the mill without any more nonsense. Lanisterre, bring that lantern here so that mademoiselle can see the path to the door. This way, if you please, ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... a young lady while you are dancing—what we call in this country—a quadrille. What nonsense do you invariably give and receive in return! No, I am a woman-scorner, and don't care to own it. I hate young ladies! Have I not been in love with several, and has any one of them ever treated me decently? I hate married women! Do they not hate me? and, simply because I smoke, try to ...
— The Fitz-Boodle Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... knowledge of law, such a steady, upright fellow, always at his post. The grating voice, the drawling accent, the bottle-green coat, were nothing to them; far less noticed, in fact, than Wilkins's expensive habits, the money he paid for his wine and horses, and the nonsense of claiming kin with the Welsh Wilkinses, and setting up his brougham to drive about —-shire lanes, and be knocked to pieces over ...
— A Dark Night's Work • Elizabeth Gaskell
... "Nonsense!" he rasped contemptuously. "What happens? Two men come to town with certain rich specimens which they claim to have taken out of their prospect hole on Cow Mountain. That was at seven o'clock last night, less than twenty-four hours ago, and some two ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... word to use in relation to this here case," said Philo Gubb grimly. "It won't be nonsense for you when you get through with it. What did ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler
... my opinion now, boys, in regard to settlin' down," said Bounce, who, having filled and lighted his pipe, now found himself in a position to state his views comfortably. "Ye see, settlin' down may, in a gin'ral way, be said to be nonsense. In pint o' fact, there ain't no sich a thing as settlin' down. When a feller sits down, why, in a short bit, he's bound to rise up agin, and when he goes to bed, he means for to get up next mornin'." (Here Bounce paused, drew several whiffs, and rammed down the tobacco in his ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne
... from him in the direct line." One would think that a child could perceive this to be a satire at the profiteers of the age, who invented ancestors, and so a child would to-day, but in the seventeenth and even the eighteenth century it was not safe to be funny. In particular, nonsense—the divine charm of which we now admit—had not been acclimatized, and was looked upon with grave displeasure. It wrings the heart that when Goldsmith, in a purple coat, pretended to think himself more attractive than the Jessamy Bride, ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse
... written and published. This was a successful literary venture, and he next published a burlesque life of Van Buren, "heir apparent to the Government, and appointed successor of Andrew Jackson," which, in the mixture of truth, error, wit, sense, and nonsense in about equal parts, has certainly the merit even at this day of being entertaining. Crockett's favorite expression was, "Be sure you're right, then go ahead." When Texas commenced its struggle for independence he went there, and was killed while gallantly fighting at San Antonio. ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... who had never suffered his country to be ill-used by any but himself. It must indeed have been difficult for any Englishman to see the salaried viceroy of France, at the most important crisis of his fate, sauntering through his haram, yawning and talking nonsense over a despatch, or beslobbering his brother and his courtiers in a fit of maudlin affection, without a respectful and tender remembrance of him before whose genius the young pride of Louis and the veteran craft of ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... to be between 'two nymphs, each answering other line for line'; but the simple alternation adopted by Spenser makes nonsense of the present poem. The above arrangement seems to distribute the lines best; viz. the first quatrain to Phillis, with interposition of lines 2 and 4 by Amaryllis, the second quatrain to Amaryllis, with interposition of line ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... unfathomable in a periodical affecting an eternal consistency, and giving itself the airs of continuous individuality, and being careful not to talk sense on a given question to-day because its founders talked nonsense upon it fifty years ago. This is quite true. There is a monstrous charlatanry about the old editorial We, but perhaps there are some tolerably obvious openings for charlatanry of a different kind under our own system. The man who writes in his own name may sometimes be tempted ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... "Oh, stop your nonsense, Katherine," said Gladys. "You make me laugh so I can't think of a thing to do. Captain, how are we going to ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey
... Polly's basket over to the school, at an early hour, Polly preferring to walk, several of the girls having called for her. So they all, with Jasper, who was going as far as the corner with them, set out amidst a chatter of merry nonsense. ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... clumsy childish way, but he peremptorily ordered me to fetch the "Times" and read to him. I began, as usual, one of the leading articles on the politics of the day, and before I had read many sentences my hearer declared that I was reading badly and made the article nonsense. Why had I put in such and such words of my own? he asked. His own precept that I was always to tell the truth under any circumstances had habituated me to be truthful even to him, so I answered boldly that I had not inserted the words attributed to me. Then I read a little ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... "Nonsense," replied Abner, with contemptuous impatience. "She likes ye, or she'd never a sent ye that warnin. Akshins speaks louder'n words. She's kinder flustered an dunno her own mind, that's all. Gals don't, genally. Ye'd be a darnation fool ter let her slip through ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... he stammered. "I don't understand.— Is our new-found happiness to be wrecked by such nonsense? Effie, think—think the thing over. What do you care what people say? You have your hole, you can creep into it whenever you like, and if you go down far enough, ...
— The Adventures of Maya the Bee • Waldemar Bonsels
... inconspicuous little figure in the smoke-gloomed light of the two oil-lamps. Man after man would snatch her up to his knee, lay by his pipe, twist her silky, yellow curls about his great blunt fingers, and whisper wood-folk tales or baby nonsense into her pink little ear. She would listen solemnly for a minute or two, then wriggle down and move on to another of her admirers. But before long she would be standing by the bench on which sat Red McWha, with one big knee usually hooked high above the other, ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... thousand a year for putting flattering notices of the schools, processions, festivals and such nonsense in his various newspapers; and our party secures the political support of the Vatican in Europe,—which just now is very necessary. The Pope must give his Christian benediction not only to our Educational system, but also ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... Ottoman Empire, and thought that with ten years of peace it might again become a respectable Power. "All that we hear about the decay of the Turkish Empire and its being a dead body or a sapless trunk, and so forth, is pure and unadulterated nonsense." Bulwer's ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... with your talk of reform—all that nonsense about social policy. We know perfectly well what it is they want; they want things for themselves. Those Socialists and Labour men are an absolutely selfish set of people. They have no sense of patriotism, like the upper classes; they simply ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... "Nonsense!" replied the busy doctor. "Porter will take any one I advise him to. All expenses and a thousand dollars—very ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... Begg, "amuses ev'ry one. An' then our soldier guest could 'ave 'is fun If 'e'd lost both 'is legs. It makes me sick 'Ere! Don't yeh spread that candle-grease too thick Yeh're wastin' it; an' us men 'as to buy Enough for nonsense, be ...
— Digger Smith • C. J. Dennis
... "What nonsense! As if that dainty scarf will hide your outlandish dress and mountainous figure!" came insultingly ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... voice that she had never heard before. Could it be possible that she really cared for Allen? But she pushed the thought from her mind resolutely. If such a thing could have been possible, she certainly would have discovered it before this. The mere thought was nonsense of course. And ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Wild Rose Lodge - or, The Hermit of Moonlight Falls • Laura Lee Hope
... grass—"the adjustment of the individual and the race to external reality." The real aim of evolution is purely external, the adjustment of man to environment; consciousness has value in so far as it promotes this adjustment. Flatly, to me, this is pure nonsense, a putting of the cart before the horse, a vulgar hysteron-proteron, none the less execrable because it is the working principle not of a single man, but of the whole of soctety to-day. Consciousness, I hold, is the supremely valuable thing, and progress, evolution, ...
— The Jessica Letters: An Editor's Romance • Paul Elmer More
... fashion, no nonsense, intrude on your walk, But rational moments of rational talk, Asserting that soiries, with jewels and dress, Make a very small part of life's happiness. Ah! this I believe, most sincerely I do, And sympathize freely, most truly ...
— The Kings and Queens of England with Other Poems • Mary Ann H. T. Bigelow
... his shoulders impatiently: "Nonsense! When did you grow so chicken-hearted, South? It is I who have to ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 1 • Various
... school-girl reading), but who is very handsome, brilliant, merry, and audacious; and two others, the handsome and dashing wives of men high in the employment of the Emperor. These ladies spend enormous sums on their toilette, and are perpetually inventing some merry and brilliant nonsense for the amusement of the Empress. Among the persons from the "outside" most in favor just now, in the inner circle of the court, is a very handsome and accomplished American lady, the youthful wife of a millionaire, possessing ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... I—I was telling them. Bag of diamonds. No. Nonsense! All rubbish! Poor man. Going home. 'Nough to pay his passage. All nonsense. ...
— The Bag of Diamonds • George Manville Fenn
... head of hair! Keep away from the women! And a Maloney! Hasn't he got a license? But, nonsense aside, what do you think of the prospects? It's a species of filibustering out ...
— Cabbages and Kings • O. Henry
... "Nonsense, Oliver," said Mr Donnithorne more testily than before; "you know very well that things must have a beginning, and that caution is necessary at first in all speculations. Besides, I feel convinced that Mr ...
— Deep Down, a Tale of the Cornish Mines • R.M. Ballantyne
... were about as transparent. Some might imagine them deep. They puzzled and nonplussed you, and you slunk away. Now I, while rating them at their worth, was able from previous associations to talk a little congenial nonsense, and pass on. They amused me, too. You know I have a sort of laughing philosophy, and everything and everybody amuses me. The fellows would call these creatures angels, and they would flap their little butterfly wings as if they thought they were. How ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... is all one, nobody looks at the thermometer! "And so the poor ship was left all alone." Such gay times she has had with all these brave young men on board! Such merry winters, such a lightsome summer! So much fun, so much nonsense! So much science and wisdom, and now it is all so still! Is the poor "Resolute" conscious of the change? Does she miss the races on the ice, the scientific lecture every Tuesday, the occasional racket and bustle of the ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale
... Philip to his father, who held him in awkward fashion, till the nurse came to the rescue and soothed his faint wailing by the usual nonsense words of endearment which then, as now, nurses seem to consider the proper language in ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... once more the "Romance of Immortality," as the sub-title of the English edition calls it. "I have not found it possible," he wrote to Mr. Bridge, who remained his confidant, "to occupy my mind with its usual trash and nonsense during these anxious times; but as the autumn advances, I myself sitting down at my desk and blotting successive sheets of paper as of yore." Concerning this place, The Wayside, he had said in a letter to George ...
— Septimius Felton - or, The Elixir of Life • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Merchant's Table? Only a big heap of old stones! What with the storm, and thinking I was going to die, and being afraid about your father, I must have been light-headed. Don't give another thought to that nonsense, Gabriel! I'm better now. We shall all live to laugh at poor grandfather for talking nonsense about crime and bloodshed in his sleep. Ah, poor old man—last night—light-headed—fancies and nonsense of an old ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... was that?"—a sudden thud, as if something had fallen somewhere in the house; then silence, except for the loud beating of my heart, that threatened to suffocate me. "Nonsense," I said to myself, "I am foolishly nervous to-night. It is nothing here, or Bogie would bark;" so I tried again to sleep. Hush! Surely that was a footstep going up or down the stairs! I could not endure the agony of being alone any longer, but would go to my ...
— J. Cole • Emma Gellibrand
... unknown real interconnection, by filling out the missing facts with mind-pictures and by bridging the chasms by empty imaginings. It had many happy thoughts in these transports (of imagination), it anticipated many later discoveries, but it also caused the survival of considerable nonsense up to the present time which could not otherwise have been possible. At present, when the results of the investigation of nature need only be conceived of dialectically, that is in the sense of their mutual interconnection, to arrive at a system of nature sufficient for ...
— Feuerbach: The roots of the socialist philosophy • Frederick Engels
... gentlemen-amateurs, who are almost always political mugwumps, and hardly ever associate with revolutionists. The earlier attempts to translate his numerous pamphlets and essays into English, resulted in ludicrous mixtures of pure nonsense with the absurdest distorsions of his ideas into the ideas of the translators. We now have a translation which is a masterpiece of interpretation and an eminent addition to our literature; but that is not because its author, Mr. Ashton Ellis, knows ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw
... the way. "Just nonsense stuff for Lily," he said. "Nothing but fooling, only the prayer ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... has to bear the weight of his body and his disproportionately large head, while the mother has a head and body which are proportionally lighter and smaller. The child is tired and stands and cries, and the mother exclaims, "Come on, you naughty little thing! I won't have any nonsense. Do you want me to carry you, lazybones? No, I won't give ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... "Nonsense. Get ready immediately," said Madam, rising from table, and measuring out the supper portion of Alfaretta, the one small servant of a house which ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond |
