"Saving grace" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... together here; what, are they gone? Ben's a brisk boy: he has got her into a corner; father's own son, faith, he'll touzle her, and mouzle her. The rogue's sharp set, coming from sea; if he should not stay for saving grace, old Foresight, but fall to without the help of a parson, ha? Odd, if he should I could not be angry with him; 'twould be but like me, a chip of the old block. Ha! thou'rt melancholic, old Prognostication; as melancholic as if thou hadst ...
— Love for Love • William Congreve
... rather an absurd business, this ritual of ours,' he answered. 'But it has at least the saving grace of antiquity to excuse it. I have a copy of the questions and answers here if you care to run your ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... overgrown village, with whose rural aspects are curiously blended something of the grimness and squalor of certain shabby city neighborhoods. Being of comparatively recent date, the place has none of those colonial associations which, like sprigs of lavender in an old chest of drawers, are a saving grace to other quite as dreary ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... grimly to himself as he noted the new Town Hall. He had met a good many robber-politicians during his wanderings in the Dago Republics; but all of them had, at least, the saving grace of frankness. The aim and end of their policy was to arrive safely in Paris, with the contents of the national treasury as their baggage. They did not hunger after honours, such as knighthoods, or aspire to speak at Sunday ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... Suppose her father were back, or her sister or brother were in! He decided to gamble, and ask for them all first, so that if he were in luck and they were not there, it would be quite natural in the end to ask for Holly; while if any of them were in—an 'excuse for a ride' must be his saving grace. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... what's right, He has to try with all his might. Though true and kind in deed and word, Fred's not a vessel of the Lord. But I have hopes of him; for, oh, How can we ever surely know But that the very darkest place May be the scene of saving grace! ...
— The Victories of Love - and Other Poems • Coventry Patmore
... excused for untimely laughter; but in good sooth it so tickled my fancy to hear thee airing thine old world quips and quiddities about coat-armor, and one with whom a Standish might fitly wed, and yeomen snatched from oblivion by the saving grace of a governor's title! And look upon these rocks and wild woods and swart savages and thine own rude labors—nay then, but I ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... the Northern Democracy to bring in a world from among the mountains and valleys of California and New Mexico, or any other part of Mexico, and then quarrel about it; to bring it in, and then endeavor to put upon it the saving grace of the Wilmot Proviso. There were two eminent and highly respectable gentlemen from the North and East, then leading gentlemen in the Senate (I refer, and I do so with entire respect, for I entertain for both of those gentlemen, in general, high regard, to Mr. Dix of New York and Mr. Niles ...
— American Eloquence, Volume II. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... into the sheath, and her face was bowed in confusion. All her life, the giant slave had tended her, guarded her steps and her sleep, taught her the exercises that had made her feared by all the turbulent crew outside; and she was now permitted the saving grace of remembrance. She gave him her hand, and allowed him to place it upon his head, always his favorite means of expression when she followed an outburst of rage with contrition; and in softer tone ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... excesses of admiration, was in private life known as a man of detestable reputation, whose liaisons with women were endless, but who, in his extreme egotism and callousness had never been known to yield to the saving grace of a "grande passion,"—one of those faithful passions which sometimes make the greatness of both man and woman concerned, and adorn the pages of dull history with the brilliancy of deathless romance. Was he, Guy Beausire de Fontenelle no better, no nobler, no higher, in his desires and ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... inquisitive but more distant than the other tribes I had visited, a quality which is often a saving grace. They were very willing to be photographed, and among my subjects were three women of the nobility, called rajas, who had many coins sewn on their skirts in a way that looked quite well. One wore a head ornament such as I had not seen before, an elaborate affair lying ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz
... terribly destructive earthquake* occured in 599, it was to the Kami of earthquakes that prayers were offered at his seven shrines in the seven home provinces (Kinai), and not to the Merciful Buddha, though the saving grace of the latter had then been preached for nearly a cycle. The first appeal to the foreign deity in connexion with natural calamity was in the opening year (642) of the Empress Kogyoku's reign when, in the presence of a devastating ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... libraries which are erected now and again with funds provided by the wills of the illiterate. How dreadful must be the last moments of that person who has steadfastly refused to share the companionship and acknowledge the saving grace of books! ...
— The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac • Eugene Field
... in regard to the Aurora. He hasn't the saving grace of an excuse, now, not to convey that last ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... "Concerning our dear Esquimaux congregation, we may truly and thankfully declare that we have perceived a continued work of the Holy Spirit within their souls, leading them to a better acquaintance with themselves as depraved creatures, who stand in daily need of the saving grace of our Almighty Saviour. They are earnest in prayer to him that he would preserve them from falling back into their former wicked and superstitious courses." The accounts from Nain were to the same effect: "Our communicants," say they, "have made a perceptible advance both ...
— The Moravians in Labrador • Anonymous
... and old-fashioned,—all their rude notions of sociology, all their errors and mistakes, the work of the Franciscan Fathers was glorified by unselfish aim, high motive and constant and persistent endeavor to bring their heathen wards into a knowledge of saving grace. It was a brave and heroic endeavor. It is easy enough to find fault, to criticize, to carp, but it is not so easy to do. These men did! They had a glorious purpose which they faithfully pursued. They aimed high ...
— The Old Franciscan Missions Of California • George Wharton James
... have had the saving grace of common sense had it not been delayed so long; but it required the imminence of military destruction and an intimation from President Wilson that peace could not be concluded with those who had made the war, to provoke that ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... was coming; and perhaps for an instant would be tossing in my hen-coop; then back once more. And I swear that my physical and mental torments, here in my bed, would have been incomparably greater than anything I had endured on the sea, but for the saving grace of one sweet thought. She lived! She lived! And the God who had taken care o me, a castaway, would surely deliver her also from the hands of murderers and thieves. But not through me—I lay weak and helpless—and ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... He'll do for Israel, He'll do for thee; Oh soul, so marred and spoiled by sin, thou yet shall see That He has power to restore, He will receive, And thou shall know His saving grace, only believe. ...
— Mary at the Farm and Book of Recipes Compiled during Her Visit - among the "Pennsylvania Germans" • Edith M. Thomas
... has been deeply interesting to all who have been acquainted with it, and particularly so to myself. Never were the power and mercy of God more manifestly displayed, and never did his saving grace shine through a more feeble instrumentality. But God can work according to his will; and, blessed be his name, the heathen shall be given to ...
— Daughters of the Cross: or Woman's Mission • Daniel C. Eddy
... above all a corrective, it must make a painful impression on the person against whom it is directed. By laughter society avenges itself for the liberties taken with it. It would fail in its object if it bore the stamp of sympathy or kindness." If this be laughter, grant us occasionally the saving grace of tears, which may be tears of ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... a heaven of saving grace, Shines thro' the beauties of thy face, And lights our passions to a flame! Lord, how we love ...
— Hymns and Spiritual Songs • Isaac Watts
... exaggeratedly humble, though if we suppose it to be a Methodist Chapel, it may be true to life, as Methodism was the form of religion which made its appeal to the lowest classes. Indeed, at the time of its first successes, it was the saving grace of England. "But for the moral antiseptic," writes Withrow, "furnished by Methodism, and the revival of religion in all the churches which it produced, the history of England would have been far other than it was. It would probably have been swept into the maelstrom of ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... anything you like, if you will only believe me; what is the use, if you won't? Do you suppose I care less for Clarice's happiness than you do—or for Jim's either? I wish you would talk to her, and let her clarify your ideas. Faith, as you may have heard in church, is a saving grace, and essential to peace of mind. Within a month or two you will see whether I fail my friends or not, and then perhaps you will learn to trust me. Jane, I believe in you now, even if you don't believe in me; I would do almost anything to please you. You want me to change my nature: I would ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... Hancock. You have placed them the highest, and properly; for they were two, the only two, excepted from the proclamation of mercy, when Governor Gage issued his anathema against them and against their fellow-patriots. These men, thus excepted from the saving grace of the crown, now occupy the highest places in Faneuil Hall, and thus seem to be the highest in the reverence of the people of Boston. This is one of the instances in which we find tradition so much more reliable than history; for tradition ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... occasion, such being the barrack-room term for receptacles for money-hoarding purposes. The weak vessels, those who mistrust their own constancy under the varied temptations of dry throats, empty stomachs, and a scant allowance of tobacco, manage to cheat their fragility of "saving grace" by requesting their sergeant-major to put them "on the peg,"—that is to say, place them under stoppages, so that the accumulation takes place in his hands and cannot be dissipated by any premature ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... humor to the finer ends of power, was lit by a steady gaze that saw yet looked beyond, till the immediate parts of the subject appeared in due relation to the whole. Like many another man who sees farther and feels more deeply than the rest, and who has the saving grace of humor, he knew what yearning melancholy was; yet kept the springs of action tense and strong. Firm as a rock on essentials he was extremely tolerant about all minor differences. His policy was to live and let live whenever that was possible. The preservation of the Union ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood
... an absolute decree, hath elected to salvation a very small number of men, without any regard to their faith or obedience whatsoever; and secluded from saving grace all the rest of mankind, and appointed them by the same decree to eternal damnation, without any regard to their ...
— On Calvinism • William Hull
... Judge is a shabby outcast, a tavern hanger-on, a genial wayfarer who tarries longest where the inn is most hospitable, yet with that suavity, that distinctive politeness and that saving grace of humor peculiar to the American man. He has his own code of morals—very exalted ones—but honors them in the breach rather than ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... day with the book and begged me to read it, having discovered that my interest in Luther was not as living as it ought to be; so I took it out with me into the garden, because the dullest book takes on a certain saving grace if read out of doors, just as bread and butter, devoid of charm in the drawing-room, is ambrosia eaten under a tree. I read Luther all the afternoon with pauses for refreshing glances at the garden and the sky, and much thankfulness in my heart. His struggles with devils amazed me; and I wondered ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... led by downward paths to the Goat-Foot, in whom the submerged human system peeps out but fitfully, at exalted moments. He, the peevish and irascible, shy of trodden ways and pretty domesticities, is linked to us by little but his love of melody; but for which saving grace, the hair would soon creep up from thigh to horn of him. At times he will still do us a friendly turn: will lend a helping hand to poor little Psyche, wilfully seeking her own salvation; will stand ...
— Pagan Papers • Kenneth Grahame
... positively noble in you to be willing to give up one of your rooms," emphasized Emma. "As far as I am concerned I'm not a 'chooser.' I'm here because of that same saving grace—it's as much a part of you as your name—which is reaching out now to put one more girl in Overton. What can any strictly honorable, four-cornered person say except, 'I'm with you,' and here's my hand in ...
— Grace Harlowe's Return to Overton Campus • Jessie Graham Flower
... esteem. Moreover, he feels that the teacher's reprimand was unwarranted and unjust and he fain would consort with people of his own kind. Many a boy deserts school because the teacher is devoid of the saving grace of humor. Her inability to see or have any fun in life makes him uncomfortable and he seeks a ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson
... solemn, and Doctor Thurlow had many gracious words to say of the boys in the army, and spent much time reading letters from those at the front who belonged to the church and Sunday school, and spoke of the "supreme sacrifice" in the light of a saving grace; but the sermon was a gentle ponderous thing that got nowhere, spiced toward its close with thrilling scenes from battle news. John Cameron as he listened did not feel that he had found God. He did not feel a bit enlightened ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill
... followed the remark, of that laughter which is loud and yet entirely without the saving grace of merriment, a ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... sympathy. When they ask "what's the joke?" it is time to explain. Even then it is best to give merely facts and let the joke make its own way. Laughter lightens many a heavy burden, and a sense of humor is a saving grace. Cultivate ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... man, their companion, whose face seemed set in a habitual, cynical smile, the intent of which was inscrutable. The deep creases running from the corners of the mouth to the narrow nostrils showed the expression was habitual and without the saving grace of mirthfulness. Without a doubt he was of those who gain the dislike of the class from which they are derived and usually not more than the tolerance of those with whom they are thrown in daily contact. Carter admitted after a critical survey that the Gray Man, ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton
... you." He shrugged his shoulders in disgust. He felt the torrent of grief that rent her. No sob escaped her lips; there was no convulsive movement of shoulder. She rode beside him, still as the desert before the sand-storm breaks, her soul seared with white-hot iron that knows no saving grace of sob or tear. She rode as Boadicea might have ridden to battle; there was not a yielding line in her body. But over and over in her woman's heart there rang the cry: "I am so tired! If the long night ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... thou, mild delegate of God, Whose words of balm, and guiding light. Would lead us, from earth's drear abode, To worlds with bliss for ever bright,— What have the spoils of mortal fight To do with themes 'tis thine to teach? Faith's saving grace—each sacred rite Thou know'st to practice as ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, No. - 288, Supplementary Number • Various
... a meaning flourish of his stick, "there it is. The poetic spirit always dies at the advance of that ghastly fetich." Then he spoke sententiously. "Popular education is a contrivance of the devil, whereby he looks to extinguish every last saving grace from the life of the populace. Not poetry only, but all good things and all good feelings,—religion, reverence, courtesy,—sane contentment, rational ambition,—the right sort of humility, the right sort of pride,—they all ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... and knavery. A curious instance of a thorough conversion happened the same year. A lad, educated like most other well-to-do Hindoos in the schools of the Church Missionary at Mirzampore, when about fifteen, became persuaded of the saving grace of Christianity, and determined to be baptized and openly forsake his idols. His parents persecuted him, and he fled to a friend, a Hindoo convert; but he was seized by his relations, and the case was referred ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... it makes the water stand in my eyes now to remember what she said. But I didn't feel so then, my heart and my soul were rebellious, and love for Dan alone kept me under, not love for God. And in fact, if ever I'd got to heaven then, love for Dan'd have been my only saving grace; for I was mighty high-spirited, as a girl. Well, Dan he never made open profession; but when he left the house, he went and asked ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 55, May, 1862 • Various
... had the saving grace of humour. For twenty-four hours I had been on the stretch to save Colonel Waynflete from his enemies. To do it I had left mother and sister, and home and lands. To do it I had come out openly on ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... the smiling of the river Mirror of the Savior's face, Saints whom death will never sever Lift their songs of saving grace. ...
— The Otterbein Hymnal - For Use in Public and Social Worship • Edmund S. Lorenz
... next step. It is not enough to tell us that we must conquer the wrong by doing the right. The question is this: Is there any power, anything in what is called saving grace, which is adequate to the struggle on our part, and which appropriated can make us, to use the Apostle's ...
— Men in the Making • Ambrose Shepherd
... of ruffians, who called themselves the "Hounds," banded together to run all foreigners out of the rich camps, and to take their diggings over for themselves. A number of Chileans were beaten or shot, and their property was confiscated or destroyed. This was not in accordance with the saving grace of American justice, which devoted to a man that which he had earned. A counter organization was promptly formed, and the "Hounds" found themselves confronted with two hundred "special constables," each with a good rifle. A mass meeting sat as a court, and twenty ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... in the market-place, These advertised humilities—decreed By proclamation, that we may be freed, And mercy find for once, and saving grace, Even while we forfeit all that made the race Worthy of Heavenly favor—and profess Our faith and homage only through duress, And dread of danger which we dare ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... Turtle's claims to the Maumee and the Wabash valleys, founded on long and undisputed occupancy and possession. It never had any authority, either in fact or in history, and moreover, lacked the great and saving grace of originality. For if any Indian was the author of the doctrine that no single tribe of Indians had the power to alienate their soil, without the consent of all the other tribes, the first Indian to clearly state that proposition was Joseph Brant of the Mohawk nation, and Brant ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... in her ears, "The temple of the Lord." They reminded her of her prayers, alms, mortifications, and zeal for the good cause. They required her to recollect the time and circumstances of her conversion; the pangs she then suffered; her subsequent experiences and convictions of having received saving grace. They proceeded, as they termed it, to buffet Satan with prayers, while with impassioned hymns they endeavoured to awaken in the trembling sinner, the raptures of divine love. All sense of contrition for past offences, all disposition to be reconciled to her lord was prevented by their ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... which a man accepts pay from one to ruin him for another. That is villainy, without a single saving grace, for you are a native neither of the kingdom nor ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... one-sided God and be the one and only gateway to salvation. Deprecation of all outside the household of faith, an organised undervaluation of heretical goodness and lovableness, follows, necessarily. Every petty difference is exaggerated to the quality of a saving grace or a damning defect. Elaborate precautions are taken to shield the believer's mind against broad or amiable suggestions; the faithful are deterred by dark allusions, by sinister warnings, from books, from theatres, from worldly conversation, from all the kindly instruments that ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... explain that I didn't like such things; that I believed that there were deeper and higher things, and things more worth while. And she said yes, she was glad, and that that was going to be my saving grace; for, of course, I realized that there couldn't be anything deeper or higher or more worth while than keeping the home together, and putting up with annoyances, for the ultimate good ...
— Mary Marie • Eleanor H. Porter
... say: 'I need more grief, O God; I plainly need it. I can sin much, but I cannot correspondingly repent. O Lord, give me a molten heart. Give me tears; give me a fountain of tears. Give me the grace of tears. Drop down, ye heavens, and bedew the dryness of my heart. Give me, O Lord, this saving grace. No grace of all the graces were more welcome to me. If I may not water my couch with my tears, nor wash Thy feet with my tears, at least give me one or two little tears that Thou mayest put into Thy bottle and write in Thy book!' If your heart ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... atmosphere of chill unbelief froze the stream. The power was there, but it required for its exercise some measure of moral susceptibility. His miraculous energy followed, in general, the same law as His higher exercise of saving grace does; that is to say, it could not force itself upon unwilling men. Christ 'cannot' save a man who does not trust Him. He was hampered in the outflow of His healing power by unsympathetic disparagement and unbelief. Man can thwart God. Faith opens ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... cup of coffee," he said. "These reports are getting me down." The banality amused him—sitting here thinking of Copper and talking about coffee. Banality was at once the curse and the saving grace of mankind. It kept men from the emotional peaks and valleys that could destroy them. He chuckled shakily. The only alternative would be to get rid of her—and he couldn't (or wouldn't?—the question intruded slyly) ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone
... blue; and she noticed that his forehead, although high, shelved back abruptly to the crown of his head, which dipped down again sheer to the back of his neck, a very precipice without a single boss upon which to rest a hope of some saving grace in the way of eminent social qualities. "Thank Heaven, I see you as you ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... them. In fact, if people generally understood the ease with which whole communities could be wiped out, and grasped that it could be done so as to leave virtually no clue to the author of the horror, they might not sleep as soundly at night as they do. The saving grace is that the average criminal is often clever, but almost never truly scientific. Unfortunately, we have to combat one who possesses the latter quality to a ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... would push out his great thick lips until they threw a shadow all round him; open his dazzling white teeth and let his great blood-red tongue loll out until the chasm in his face looked like a rent in a black velvet gown with a Cardinal's red hat stuffed in the centre. He may have been full of saving grace—full up, and running over—but it was not the brand of Christianity that I should care to invest my money in. When he caught my gaze riveted upon him, he tried to look like a brand plucked from the burning; ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... and a hundred Irish members in the House of Commons. The realization of the prospect of Roman Catholic Emancipation, which had been held out as a further consideration, was postponed by the prejudices of George III until its saving grace had been lost. Grattan's prophecy of retribution for the destruction of Irish liberty has often been quoted: "We will avenge ourselves," he said, "by sending into the ranks of your parliament, and into the very heart of your constitution, one hundred of the greatest scoundrels in the kingdom"; ...
— The History of England - A Study in Political Evolution • A. F. Pollard
... that, without this saving grace of womanliness, the presentation of Camille, with all its hectic surroundings, would have repelled him. He did not care to see Mademoiselle Bernhardt a second time in the role, and he fled from the ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... thou lamp-carrier! have a care and look to thyself; content not thyself with only that which will maintain thee in a profession, for that may be done without saving grace; but I advise thee to go to Aaron, to Christ the trimmer of our lamps, and beg of him thy vessel full of oil, that is, grace for the seasoning of thy heart, that thou mayest have wherewith not only to bear thee up now, but at the day of the bridegroom's coming when many a lamp will ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin |
