"Silly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "You silly!" struck in Joan sharply. "That wasn't weally muver; it was only the bit of her that used to be tired and sick and have headiks. But the thinkin' place and the part of her that used to say 'Joan, darlin',' and 'Darby, my son,' in such a cuddlin' kind of voice, ...
— Two Little Travellers - A Story for Girls • Frances Browne Arthur
... as silly as we can act!" she cried, speaking loud so that they could all hear her. "We mustn't give up hope. The boys, or Mr. Cameron, will find us. It ...
— Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp • Alice Emerson
... while this naughty person stepped in and robbed us of the only possessions worth having? No, no! It is not that he has done us harm—the one cheerful item in a universe of stony facts is that no one can harm anybody except himself—it is merely that we have been silly, precisely as silly as if we had taken a seat in the rain with a folded umbrella by our side.... The machine is at fault. I fancy we are now obtaining glimpses of what ...
— The Human Machine • E. Arnold Bennett
... a celebrity, of which we were ourselves at that time unaware. He was the identical bird which was brought from Marignan to Prince Maurice, governor of the Brazils, and whose pertinent answers to many silly questions are recorded in the pages of the greatest of English philosophers. My great grandfather was soon disgusted with the folly and cruelty of what is called civilized life; and having seen an Indian ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, No. - 488, May 7, 1831 • Various
... "Don't be silly, Harold," she retorted. "You have kissed me so much now that my hair is all down, and my face must be a sight. Lips are what you are supposed to kiss with—you don't have to kiss ...
— The Efficiency Expert • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... there are people robbed of their rights—communities laid waste—faith, justice, commerce trampled upon, and wellnigh destroyed—nay, in the very centre of royalty itself, what horrible stains and meanness, crime and shame! It is but to a silly harlot that some of the noblest gentlemen, and some of the proudest women in the world, are bowing down; it is the price of a miserable province that the king ties in diamonds round his mistress's white neck. In the first half of the last century, I say, this is going on all Europe ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Hobgoblin call you, and sweet Pucke, You do their worke, and they shall haue good lucke. Are not you he? Rob. Thou speak'st aright; I am that merrie wanderer of the night: I iest to Oberon, and make him smile, When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile, Neighing in likenesse of a silly foale, And sometime lurke I in a Gossips bole, In very likenesse of a roasted crab: And when she drinkes, against her lips I bob, And on her withered dewlop poure the Ale. The wisest Aunt telling the saddest tale, Sometime for three-foot stoole, mistaketh ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... a couple of young ladies; one of them has the character of the prettiest company, yet really I thought her but silly; the other, who talked a great deal less, I observed to have understanding. The lady who is reckoned such a companion among her acquaintance, has only, with a very brisk air, a knack of saying the commonest ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... capital. I've lost mine. Unless I get help, an' a thumpin' big slice of it, my name figures in the Gazette. I want fifty thousand pounds, an' oo's goin' to give it to me? Not the public. They're fed up on shippin'. They're not so silly as they used to be. I put it to owd Dickey yesterday, an' 'e said you couldn't raise money in Liverpool to-day to build a ferry-boat. But 'e said summat else. If you wed 'im, 'e makes you a partner in the firm of Verity, Bulmer an' Co. ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... of a man who in Chamisso's tale sold his shadow to the devil, a synonym of one who makes a desperate or silly bargain. ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... Peake. We made a leisurely journey up the country, as it was of no use to overtake our stores. At Beltana Mr. Chandler had got and kept my black boy Dick, who pretended to be overjoyed to see me, and perhaps he really was; but he was extra effusive in his affection, and now declared he had been a silly young fool, that he didn't care for wild blacks now a bit, and would go with me anywhere. When Mr. Chandler got him he was half starved, living in a blacks' camp, and had scarcely any clothes. Leaving Beltana, in ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... of the dead Squire in his hand, and examined it with frowning care. He put one finger through the hole in the crown and moved it meditatively. And Paynter realized how fanciful his own fatigue must have made him; for so silly a thing as the black finger waggling through the rent in that frayed white relic unreasonably displeased him. The doctor soon made the same discovery with professional acuteness, and applied it much further. For when Paynter began ...
— The Trees of Pride • G.K. Chesterton
... it. "What if it is pretty? it is old-fashioned. No matter that the lace is rich, when nobody wears it. I must look as though I were dressed in my grandmother's clothes. I wish I was back in my poor home. There I am at least sheltered from criticism. I am a fool in daring to face fashion: I am the silly moth in the candle." ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various
... been capable of receiving them; he tried his very best to help her; but she felt through it all that they were barbarians to each other, and that Father Bevis regarded her as partially incomprehensible and wholly silly. ...
— A Forgotten Hero - Not for Him • Emily Sarah Holt
... it. It's all my silly fault that she went away. I thought she was getting on your nerves. But you want pulling together. That confounded place you've been to ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke
... her mother and said nothing. There was nothing to say. I had four hundred dollars in the bank and I gave her that. I didn't ask her reasons. I didn't say anything. When she had gone I cried like a silly boy. Pretty soon I had a chance to sell the house and I sent ...
— Winesburg, Ohio • Sherwood Anderson
... Silly, have you forgotten that this is Tuesday—Maggie's night out? She's gone—I told her she needn't wait to clear away. We've arranged master's supper. Master! You're ...
— Five Little Plays • Alfred Sutro
... neutral on French internal affairs.[154] This little episode should open the eyes of detractors of Pitt to the extraordinary difficulty of his position. Of one thing we may be certain. The readiest way of assuring the doom of the hapless monarch was to take up some one of the silly or guileful schemes then mooted for pressing the British Government to take sides in the trial. Pitt's rigorous neutrality was the best means of helping the advocates of Louis in their uphill fight ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... What bolting, tramping, and rushing would they not have made through the ranks of the astonished professors and students? The Anniversary set, for example, who sweep the pews of men, or, coming upon one forlorn, crush him as a boa does a sheep. Our silly little flock only laughed, colored, and retreated to the volantes, where they held a council of war, and decided to go visit some establishment where possibly ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... "he has no moral force, no imagination. He judges men by their manners, which is silly. He thinks that every one who is polite to him believes in him. He will have to send in ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... message of Rudyard Kipling, that upon which he has really concentrated, is the only thing worth worrying about in him or in any other man. He has often written bad poetry, like Wordsworth. He has often said silly things, like Plato. He has often given way to mere political hysteria, like Gladstone. But no one can reasonably doubt that he means steadily and sincerely to say something, and the only serious question is, What is that which he has tried to say? Perhaps ...
— Heretics • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... "How silly you are!—Don't look over there: I see M. Pincette coming to ask us to dance. The more I see of him, the more I detest him. He is stupid, he is fair, his whiskers are too large, he doesn't dance in time: he has no attractions. Don't you think he looks like the Abbe Julien, who used ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various
... ordinary expense. But while the funds arising from extensive farms, and the abundant produce of a fertile soil, enabled the rich to indulge extravagant habits, many of the less wealthy envied the enjoyment of those luxuries which fortune had denied to them; and, prompted by vanity, and a silly desire of imitation, so common in civilized communities, they pursued a career which speedily led to the accumulation of debt, and demanded the interference of the legislature; and it is probable that a law, so severe as this must have appeared to the Egyptians, was only adopted as a measure ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... man did.... Funny—how the sky fell down and turned over and over like a blue carpet rolling you up, and the grass caught at your face— it couldn't have been spiteful— it must have been saving itself. Hot road... silly wind playing with your hair.... The road smelled of horses. I only got up when ...
— Sun-Up and Other Poems • Lola Ridge
... two things,' said Althea, who felt some remonstrance necessary. Miss Buchanan said no, she supposed not; it was silly to be superstitious; yet ...
— Franklin Kane • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... that we heard the booming bark of dogs echoing from great buildings at the back. And now the half-weaned calves that have been sheltering themselves in a gorse-built hovel against the left-hand wall come out and set up a silly answer to that terrible bark, doubtless supposing that it has ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various
... silly sheep!" murmured the Maid as she watched, "and yet you are not to blame, but those who lead you. When will they understand? When ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... is the Queen of Nonsense Land, She wears her bonnet on her hand; She carpets her ceilings and frescos her floors, She eats on her windows and sleeps on her doors. Oh, ho! Oh, ho! to think there could be A lady so silly-down-dilly as she! ...
— The Jingle Book • Carolyn Wells
... this means art taken off from leaning on any thing below Jesus for eternal life. It is likely, if thou wast not sensible of many by-thoughts and wickednesses in thy best performances, thou wouldst go near to be some proud, abominable hypocrite, or a silly, proud, dissembling wretch at the best; such a one as wouldst send thy soul to the devil in a bundle of ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin
... his bathing suit and was climbing into his clothes when I arrived. He beamed at me and his whole face crinkled into smiles. I was so afraid that he was going to make a silly speech that I pushed his automatic into his hands and said, "You'd better take this, old man. The other party's in swift retreat and, from the condition of his wrist, I don't fancy you'll receive another billet-doux ...
— The Lost Valley • J. M. Walsh
... his chair, put her hands on his shoulders, and kissed him gently on the forehead. "Never mind, dear. You mustn't let these silly people annoy you. I'm sorry now I worried you to-night about my brother, Jimmy. I might have left it until the ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... chloroform, the smell of antiseptics, the shiny instruments, the cutting, the nipping of blood-vessels with forceps and tying them, the clipping with scissors, the sewing—all went to my head. And I constantly had to tell myself, 'Don't be silly! You're not going to faint. He might fail if you did. That tray, those forceps, those sponges, that thread, that's what he wants now. Keep your head. Don't be a quitter.' And so on through eternity—it seemed an eternity, anyway. I think ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... was silly enough to fall in love with you from the first, Francisco, and I was sure that you, in your dull English fashion, cared for her. My father confided to me, long since, that he hoped it would ...
— The Lion of Saint Mark - A Story of Venice in the Fourteenth Century • G. A. Henty
... failed humanity if it is so blinded by the monstrous agony in Flanders as to miss the essential triviality at the head of the present war. Not the slaughter of ten million men can make the quality of the German Kaiser other than theatrical and silly. ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... and solacing the weary hours, though doubtless they were as sly and kept themselves as unobserved as possible. Four Yarmouth men—old sea-dogs, perhaps, who loved their pipe—were in 1687 fined 4s. each for smoking tobacco around the end of the meeting-house. Silly, ostrich-brained Yarmouth men! to fancy to escape detection by hiding around the corner of the church; and to think that the tithing-man had no nose when he was ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... that we were actually a live club, come together with a genuine aim to do real good. I can see now that we are going to accomplish something worth while. We are not going to be merely a set of empty-headed, silly women with nothing to do. Oh, I tell you that I have some great plans, now that at last we are really started out right. Now, we can outline our plans of work among women less fortunate than we ourselves. We can find places for them, we can lead them on to better things, ...
— Making People Happy • Thompson Buchanan
... Zaareth; farewell, Temainte. [Exeunt JEWS.] And, Barabas, now search this secret out; Summon thy senses, call thy wits together: These silly men mistake the matter clean. Long to the Turk did Malta contribute; Which tribute all in policy, I fear, The Turk has [30] let increase to such a sum As all the wealth of Malta cannot pay; And now by ...
— The Jew of Malta • Christopher Marlowe
... to a widowed father, the home sister to two brothers, she would be consulted, leant on, confided in. Mr. Symons missed his wife at every turn, but he never felt Henrietta could take her place. Her nagging shut up his heart against her. He thought it silly, rather unfairly, perhaps, for she inherited the habit from her mother, and he had never thought ...
— The Third Miss Symons • Flora Macdonald Mayor
... goodness to step directly to Wrasp and Co.'s in Broad Street, and inquire if they have had instructions to appear in Carkem and Painter. THAT lad a robber,' sneered Sampson, flushed and heated with his wrath. 'Am I blind, deaf, silly; do I know nothing of human nature when I see it before me? Kit ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... born at Maidstone, and has done eleven years' service. During the attack on the 6th he was sitting beside his gun waiting for Major Abdy's word to fire in his turn, when a 96lb. shell from "Bulwan" struck him in its flight, and shattered his left arm and leg. He says he was knocked silly, and felt a bit fluttered, but had no pain till they lifted him into the dhoolie. He broke the record, I believe, by surviving a double amputation on the same side, which left him only about 6 in. of thigh and 4 in. of arm. For every movement he ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... should be insulted so by a perfect stranger in my own home!" And the Countess wept some more. "What earthly connection is there between your silly questions about the Earl's cigars and the diamond-robbery, I should ...
— The Adventures of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons • James Francis Thierry
... of that," observed the lieutenant; "except a few silly young people of the better classes, and the poor, who look out for the loaves and fishes in the shape of coals and blankets and other creature comforts, I don't think many are influenced by him. He is more likely to empty his church, and to ...
— Clara Maynard - The True and the False - A Tale of the Times • W.H.G. Kingston
... Graham immensely, was seized with sudden diffidence. He was a connoisseur in all matters of art. Suppose he should say right before Miss Pritchard, that she was only a silly tomboy, or whatever such a gentleman would say to express that idea? She glanced ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray
... Almost he hoped he should not find the man, and could believe that he had dreamed the angel vision. But when he came, after a long, toilful walk, to the village, and the square, alas! there was the clown, doing his silly tricks for ...
— Stories to Tell to Children • Sara Cone Bryant
... the talk had to have a silly meretricious flavour in it which tired him further; in the afternoon they walked on the front; and they went to another hotel for tea. There was a blaring band and much noise and laughter from all the pleasure-people. The air ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... big, fat, red star-fish, who was sticking to the side of a rock. Why the dragonet snapped at him I have no idea. I do not believe he hurt him; but the star-fish gradually relaxed his hold, and fell slowly and helplessly on to his back; on which the dragonet looked as silly as the Sultan of Casgar's purveyor when the hunchback fell beneath his blows. Another dragonet came hastily up to see what was the matter; but prudently made off again, and left the star-fish and his neighbour as they were. I waited a long ...
— Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... be a Sunday-school teacher, but I average up pretty well, after all. I appear to a disadvantage. When Raimon died I took hold of his business out here and I've made it pay. I have a talent for business, and I like it. I've got enough to be silly with if I want to, but I intend to take care of myself—and I may even marry again. I can see you're deeply involved in a love affair, Mose, and I honestly want to help you—but I shan't say another word about it—only remember, when you need help ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... Barnaby, and the children of the place came flocking round him—as she remembered to have done with their fathers and mothers round some silly beggarman, when a child herself. None of them knew her; they passed each well-remembered house, and yard, and homestead; and striking into the fields, were ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... and women's faces. 'I cannot go home,' thought the girl, and acting in direct contradiction to her thoughts, she walked forward. Her parasol—where was it? It was broken. She brushed herself, she picked bits of furze from her dress. She held each away from her and let it drop in a silly, vacant way, all the while running the phrases over in her mind: 'He threw me down and ill-treated me; my frock is ruined, what a state it is in! I had a narrow escape of being murdered. I will tell them that... that will explain ... ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... by her, but to some one else by some other woman?' In reality this should have been a matter of indifference to him ... and yet he had to admit to himself that he did not want this to be so. 'That would be too silly,' he thought, 'even sillier than this!' A nervous unrest began to gain possession of him; he began to shiver—not outwardly, but inwardly. He several times took his watch out of his waistcoat pocket, looked at the face, put it back, and each time forgot how many ...
— Dream Tales and Prose Poems • Ivan Turgenev
... will. It may hurt Milly, she is so gentle and dear, and you are their best friend. I won't have it! I won't! I'm tired, anyway, of having fun made of all the sacred things in life. All of us swing around in a silly whirl and when a woman like Mildred begins to live her life in a—er—natural way, we—ridicule! She is brave and strong and works hard; and she has the real things of life and makes the sacrifices for ...
— Andrew the Glad • Maria Thompson Daviess
... which. Why, it is like a miracle, the finding of this bag out here in the desert. It is the clue I have been searching after for nearly five years." He seemed to pull himself together with an effort, realizing her presence. "Excuse me, Miss McDonald, but this thing knocked me silly. I hardly knew what I ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... the doors an' winnocks rattle, I thought me on the ourie cattle, Or silly sheep, wha bide this brattle O' winter war, And thro' the drift, deep-lairing, sprattle ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott
... his men, resolved to raise the siege for a time; but the defenders were so unfortunate as to have their powder damaged by the women they had within. Having sent them out by silence of night to draw in water, out of a well that lay just at the entrance of the castle, the silly women were in such fear, and the room they brought the water into being so dark for want of light, when they came in they poured the water into a vat, missing the right one, wherein the few barrels of powder they had lay. And in the morning, when the men came for more powder, having exhausted ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... cards bearing aces and spades, and cards with the likenesses of Dr. Busby's son and servant, Doll the dairymaid, and the like. When it comes to a question of profit, one is an amusement involving a good deal of healthy, mental exertion, while the other is about as silly and profitless a way of spending an evening as can well be imagined. Youth must not dance, but they may march to music in company, and go through calisthenic exercises, involving a good deal more motion than dancing. ...
— Amusement: A Force in Christian Training • Rev. Marvin R. Vincent.
... artist, I mustn't be a comic-supplement wife and object to his using models!' Oh, I was going to be so good and reasonable. You would have loved me! And then, when it came to the real thing, I found I just could not stand it. I know it's silly of me. I know just as well as you do that Miss Vince is quite a nice girl really, and is going to make a splendid Mrs. Travelling Salesman, but that doesn't help me. It's my wicked nature, I suppose. I'm just a plain ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... much that a young woman may do for herself which I think you have done. A silly girl, though she had been a second Helen, would hardly ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... could see a ravenous hawk upon a tree, abashed at Mr. Prigg's presence and superior ability; and a fluttering timid lark seemed to shriek, "Wicked bird, live and let live;" but it was the last word the silly lark uttered, for the hawk was upon him in a moment, and the little innocent songster was crushed in its ravenous beak. Still the cuckoo sang on in praise of Mr. Prigg, with now and then a little note for Mrs. ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... you were too sensible to play such a silly game as this. If I had any Kitty-mouse I'd have a good one who liked you to play in safe pleasant ways, and not destroy and frighten. Just see what a ruin you have made; all Daisy's pretty dolls, Demi's soldiers, and Rob's new village beside poor Teddy's pet lamb, and dear old Annabella. I shall ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... And her silly hand clutching the window ledge. She let go, quick, afraid he would turn sentimental at the end. But no; he was settling down heavily in his corner, blinking ...
— The Romantic • May Sinclair
... would not disgrace the poet and his admirer. Garrick produced a passage that he had once heard the Doctor commend, in which he now found, if I remember rightly, sixteen faults, and made Garrick look silly at his own table. When I told Mr. Johnson the story, "Why, what a monkey was David now," says he, "to tell of his own disgrace!" And in the course of that hour's chat he told me how he used to tease Garrick by commendations of the tomb-scene in Congreve's 'Mourning Bride,' protesting, that Shakespeare ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... At first only confused words, silly excuses, clumsy falsehoods, cruelly absurd phrases—caprices, nothing serious, whim, madness—so many avowals, so many insults, came to his lips. But then, before the silence of Adrienne, he could say nothing more, he was speechless, overwhelmed, and sought ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... is one bigger mistake than another," she said, "it is the mistake of being fond of any one. Oh, how silly girls are when they get engaged ...
— A Young Mutineer • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... earliest known specimen of Castilian prose; and several smaller works, now collected under the general title of 'Opuscules Legales' (Minor Legal Writings). It was long supposed that he wrote the 'Tesoro' (Thesaurus), a curious medley of ignorance and superstition, much of it silly, and all of it curiously inconsistent with the acknowledged character of the enlightened King. Modern scholarship, however, discards this petty treatise from the list of ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... hopping around with leaves in their teeth would look silly," objected the man, "I doubt if I could ...
— The Scarlet Car • Richard Harding Davis
... she ain't anything—that's about the worst I can say of her. There ain't anything bad about her—oh, no. Sometimes I've been driven to wish there was, if I do say it! She's just what I should call one of them characterless sort of folks—kind of soft and silly, like a silk sofy cushion without enough stuffing in it. Always talking, she is, without saying anything in particular. I don't know about the children. They were little things when I saw 'em last. What do ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... magic arts and incantations. But I have never experienced anything of the sort until to-day. Compose yourself, my dear good comrade, and go with me back to the shore." Fadrique laughed fiercely, and answered, "Set aside your silly delusion, and if you must have everything explained to you, word by word, in order to understand it, know then that the lady whom you came to meet in the shrubbery of this my garden is Dona Clara ...
— The Two Captains • Friedrich de La Motte-Fouque
... for his mother had magnified his scruples—very pious and respectable scruples, but exaggerated. As he put this conclusion into words in his own mind he felt happy, as at the doing of a good action; and he resolved to be nice to every one beginning with his father, whose manias, and silly statements, and vulgar opinions, and too conspicuous mediocrity were a constant ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... wives in America are knocking the church debt silly, by working up their husbands' groceries into "angel food" and selling them below actual cost, is deserving of the ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... "Come, come, my silly child; do you imagine that a contract is like a house of cards which you can blow down at will? Dear little ignoramus, you don't know what trouble we have had to found an entail for the benefit of your eldest son. Don't ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... Don't be a silly idiot! I think Miss Strong's absolutely adorable. Don't you like the decorations in the corridor? Miss Godwin and some of the School of Art students did them. But just wait till you've seen the lecture-hall! Here we are! Now then, what d'you ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... cool and composed: "Oh come on, Kit don't be silly. There's enough to do, goodness knows, without you staging a ...
— The Merriweather Girls and the Mystery of the Queen's Fan • Lizette M. Edholm
... night, to keep the silly sheep, Hosts of angels in their sight came down from heaven's high steep. Tidings! tidings! unto you: to you a Child is born, Purer than the drops of dew, and brighter than the morn. ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow, Vol. IV (of IV) • Harrison S. Morris
... themselves whether they ever said anything to their sweethearts, and those young men have answered, "No; that they didn't know as they did." So that I am inclined to believe that they are contented with that silent utterance of the heart which is so superior to the silly whisperings one hears ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... had no reason at all except wanton mischief. Perhaps he used the buttons for marbles; there cannot be any real reason for such a silly deed, though he may make one up. Well, why did ...
— Barbara in Brittany • E. A. Gillie
... contemptible and silly as it was reprehensible for a late celebrated novelist to pretend that he believed there was at place called Bloomsbury-square, but he really did not know; because that was merely done for the purpose of raising a silly laugh among persons who were ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... Oh! if one only knew what one puts one's foot into when we love a man, on my word of honor we would let you alone to take care of yourselves, you men! However, if you are going away to-morrow we won't talk of disagreeable things,—that would be silly." ...
— Parisians in the Country - The Illustrious Gaudissart, and The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... To-morrow is their last day for walking, and, like loving fools as they are, they will be so absorbed in each others' feelings, and the silly sentimentality of love, as to be easily surprised. Yes, to-morrow ...
— Ellen Walton - The Villain and His Victims • Alvin Addison
... silly girl. I am only 'dear' and you are 'my dear.' He thinks of me as a mother, and of you as the chief person in the world. I think you are getting vain and greedy, Marjorie. Well, I must put these bonbons away, or the children will see ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... for suppositions and analysis," panted Fitzgerald, reknotting his silk tie. "As for me, I go to the Arctic; cold, but safe. I have never fallen in love. I have enjoyed the society of many women, and to some I've been silly enough to write, but I have never been maudlin. I'm no fool. This is the place where it would be most likely to happen. Let us beat an orderly retreat. What the devil ails my fingers to-night? M'h! ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath
... going to repeat her half-silly words?" demanded Miss Blake, angrily. "Poor dear, she was out of her mind half the ...
— The Uninhabited House • Mrs. J. H. Riddell
... silly woman! what d'ye suppose I'd chance breakin' me neck gettin' out o' me buggy fer, but a drink o' ...
— Nancy McVeigh of the Monk Road • R. Henry Mainer
... great merit as an artist. He was in Rome the winter I was there, and I met him in society, and saw several of his pictures. He was rather injured artistically, I think, by living with mad lords and silly ladies who used to pet and spoil him, which sort of thing damages our artists, who become bitten with the "aristocratic" mania, and destroy themselves as fine workmen in their ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... to be. But, she blushed with shame—what must he think of her? Of her defense of Bethune, of her deliberate rudeness, and worst of all, of her night ride with the horse-thieves? He knew she had suspected him—had even accused him. Would he ever regard her as other than a silly fool? Vividly she pictured him as he had looked lashing his way to her through the wildly crowding horse herd, determined, capable, masterful—and wondered vaguely what her answer would have been had he made love to ...
— The Gold Girl • James B. Hendryx
... the sea, along the shore, In numbers more and ever more, From lonely hut and busy town, The valley through, the mountain down, What was it ye went out to see, Ye silly folk of Galilee? The reed that in the wind doth shake? The weed that washes in the lake? The reeds that waver, the weeds that float?— young man preaching ...
— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald
... of his duties as a member of the guard he was very conscientious and ever on the alert. No stray pig, wandering sheep, or silly calf could pass in front of his part of the line without being investigated by him. It is possible that his vigilance in investigating intruding meats was sharpened by the hope of substantial recognition in the way of a stray rib extracted from the marauding ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... silly women! I told you you were dreaming!" said I, and had turned to go, reassured and relieved, when Alicia's nose wrinkled. I could hardly ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler
... than that the Commissioners from the Confederated States will be received here and recognized by Abraham Lincoln. I will now predict that this Republican Party that is going to enforce the Laws, preserve the Union, and collect Revenue, will never attempt anything so silly; and that instead of taking Forts, the troops will be withdrawn from those which we now have. See if this does not turn out to be so, in less than a ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... solid, solemn fool. Another disguise they have, (for fools, as well as knaves, take other names, and pass by an alias) and that is, the title of honest fellows. But this honesty of theirs ought to have many grains for its allowance; for certainly they are no farther honest, than they are silly: They are naturally mischievous to their power; and if they speak not maliciously, or sharply, of witty men, it is only because God has not bestowed on them the gift of utterance. They fawn and crouch to men ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden
... no response. Her eyes were fastened upon the road ahead, and evidently my lady possessed no desire for the discovery of any such tie. Watching her, I pressed my lips together, and held her as a proud and silly fool. ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... criminal lieutenant to join with the others in signing the report, and almost at the same moment he learned that the cause of his adversaries was strengthened by the adhesion of a certain Messire Rene Memin, seigneur de Silly, and prefect of the town. This gentleman was held in great esteem not only on account of his wealth and the many offices which he filled, but above all on account of his powerful friends, among whom was the cardinal-duke himself, to whom he had formerly been of use when the cardinal was ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... mind racing. "This is silly," he said finally. "Perfectly idiotic. Those schools must ...
— Infinite Intruder • Alan Edward Nourse
... been to college together, and we were going to the Bar together, when - you know! Dear, dear me! what a pity that was! A life spoiled, a fine young fellow as good as buried here in the wilderness with rustics; and all for what? A frolic, silly, if you like, but no more. God, how good your scones ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... suppose it is evident to all that Miss Mayhew's early and, indeed, present influences are sadly against her; but unfortunate as have been her associations of late, I am coming to the belief that, however faulty she may be, she is not naturally either silly or weak. But my acquaintance with her is very slight, and I must confess I do not understand her very well. For some reason she shuns me and has evidently disliked me from ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... moral. And there are so many histories for young people to read. They ought to have the real truth instead of silly make-believes and trashy ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas
... old-fashioned Dutch winders. I ducked my head, and he hit that. I knew it hurt him, for he did not use that duke any more. I got in under him, let fly with my head, and caught him square in the face. It made him grunt, but the next time I got one in on him I made him look silly, for the blood came out of his ears and nose. He said, ...
— Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi • George H. Devol
... saying his prayers to mamma," says the little girl, who came up to her papa's knees; and my lord burst out into another great laugh at this, and kinsman Henry looked very silly. He invented a half-dozen of speeches in reply, but 'twas months afterwards when he thought of this adventure: as it was, he had never a word ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... think he will ever make a really good Hun. He is rather like a child who for four years has been crying incessantly for the moon. Having got it, he says, "Well, I'm glad I've got it; now let's get on with something else," and takes not the slightest interest in the silly old moon he has acquired with so ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, March 12, 1919 • Various
... in the darkness of the autumn night with frightened eyes. She hated herself for feeling nervous. She had told Aunt Raby that, of course, she would have no silly tremors, yet here she was trembling and scarcely able to pay ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... girl said—and she laughed a little self-consciously. "My reason tells me it's a silly way to feel. I can never quite consider theology and the preachers from the same dispassionate plane that dad can. There's a foolish sense of personal grievance. Dad had it once, too, but he got over it long ago. I never have. Perhaps you'll understand if I tell you. My mother was ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... set about it methodically, eagerly. It was something to occupy her mind and keep out a little of that burning sense of shame. One picture it could not obliterate, and that was the scene of Jacqueline and Pierre le Rouge laughing together over the love affair with the silly ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand
... air is full of the clamour of rich and prosperous people invited to pay taxes, and beyond measure bitter. They are going to live abroad, cut their charities, dismiss old servants, and do all sorts of silly, vindictive things. We seem to be doing feeble next-to-nothings in the endowment of research. Not one in twenty of the boys of the middle and upper classes learns German or gets more than a misleading smattering of physical science. Most of them never learn ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... it, but were hindered by the stupidity of the calf. The latter was placed between them in such a way that the heads of the bull and cow were in opposite directions, and thus both flanks were guarded. In this way the buffaloes might have held their ground, but the silly calf when closely menaced by the wolves foolishly started out, rendering it necessary for its protectors to assume a ...
— The Hunters' Feast - Conversations Around the Camp Fire • Mayne Reid
... some more about what you did last week—I mean, how you took a room across the street and spied upon that hateful man and saw through the whole thing when we were too blind to know what was going on. And I want to apologize for the silly things I said that Sunday morning. Will you ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... of much ignorance," he continued to Martin. "They have much fear. They know a silly story their mothers have told them, about the Evil Ones calling from the deep pit; it is a—what you say?—a folk story of the Japanese. These men are of ignorance. But we gentlemen know it is of absurdness, and most untrue. It is a story of ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... unusual degree. It seemed impossible that she could be acting as a decoy for unworthy ends. He laughed at the thought, and at the fun he would some day have in recounting his fears to her, and at her imaginary explanation of the driver's silly talk. At the same time he examined his revolver, which he kept well concealed, despite the law, in the depths of ...
— The Ghost of Guir House • Charles Willing Beale
... women force us to the polls, or compel us to vote for this silly measure? Besides, the state constitution is a perfect protection; only males can vote. This is all a form of feminine hysteria, Stacey; it's bound to pass. Just sit tight in the boat and wait. I don't mind telling ...
— The Co-Citizens • Corra Harris
... trail of blood on the grass plot. Dr. Talbot, who was there, will remember how she looked on that occasion; but I doubt if he noticed how Abel here looked, or so much as remarked the faded flower the silly boy had stuck ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green
... his silly way of talking, sir. He would say, 'Tomlinson, if you tell the pater what time I came home last night I'll stab you to the heart.' When there was a bit of a family squabble he would threaten to mix a gallon of weed-killer and drink every drop. Everything was rotten, or beastly, ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... I had several little caches in the holes of trees, or the chinks of buildings, where we concealed small coins or curious stones on our walks, and at a later date revisited them. We were frankly silly about certain things. He and I had some imaginary personages—Dr. Waddilove, supposed to be a rich beneficed clergyman of Tory views; Mr. McTurk, a matter-of-fact Scotsman; Henry Bland, a retired schoolmaster with copious stores of information; ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... boy. Do you think it is a nice thing, a gentlemanly thing, upright, and honest, and worthy of Papa's only son, to sneak about listening to what you were not meant to hear. Now don't begin to cry, Reginald," he added, rather sharply; "you have nothing to cry for, and it's either silly or ill-tempered to whimper because I show you that you've done wrong. Anybody may do wrong; and if you think that you have, why say you're sorry, like a man, and ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... person who could deliberately adopt such a conclusion should trouble himself any more to look for truth. If a mere absurdity could make its way out of a little fishing village in Galilee, and spread through the whole civilized world; if men are so pitiably silly, that in an age of great mental activity their strongest thinkers should have sunk under an absorption of fear and folly, should have allowed it to absorb into itself whatever of heroism, of devotion, self-sacrifice, ...
— Froude's Essays in Literature and History - With Introduction by Hilaire Belloc • James Froude
... freely. Places asked in this way are never out of place," said the minister, laughing; for there is no jest too silly ...
— Bureaucracy • Honore de Balzac
... all?" asked Teacher. Then without waiting for a reply he added, "It is because of the way Mrs. Teacher and I build our nest. Some people think it is like an oven and so they call us Oven Birds. I think that is a silly name myself, quite as silly as Golden Crowned Thrush, which is what some people call me. I'm not a Thrush. I'm not even related to the Thrush family. I'm a Warbler, ...
— The Burgess Bird Book for Children • Thornton W. Burgess
... the guard and seals to wear on festive occasions. But the watch, no. He has had enough of such silly things. Henceforth, as formerly, the sun will suffice him for a timekeeper. That is not given to dying, nor does it require sitting up with at night and such like attentions, and it manages its own ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... an Old Person of Chili, Whose conduct was painful and silly; He sate on the stairs, Eating apples and pears, That ...
— Book of Nonsense • Edward Lear
... a few days that nebulous mass of whirling particles—the disorderly children—began to take definite form. The children seemed to begin to find their own way; in many of the objects they had at first despised as silly playthings, they began to discover a novel interest, and, as a result of this new interest, they began to act as independent individuals." Miss George's subsequent expression is: "They became extremely individual." "Thus it came to pass that an object of absorbing interest to one ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... as he accepted this assurance, telling himself that his brother magistrate was as honest as he was silly. ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... After which Spillikins used to be invited up to the house by Edward and Adelina. They both used to tell him how much they owed him; and they, too, used to join in the chorus and say, "You know, Peter, you're awfully silly ...
— Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich • Stephen Leacock
... likely to make a man repose, with slumbering virtue upon them, for the distinction he is to receive in society, than to inspire the effort of rendering himself worthy of them. They are to men what beauty is to women, a dangerous gift, which has a natural tendency to make them indolent, silly, and worthless. Let property be hereditary, but let titular honours be the reward of noble or useful exertions. France, in her folly, has destroyed them totally, instead of making them conditional.” Howbeit, titled people appear to have been highly honoured ...
— Anna Seward - and Classic Lichfield • Stapleton Martin
... came home, resolved to pay the newly-married couple a visit; and, suddenly, told Athelwold to prepare for his immediate coming. Athelwold, terrified, confessed to his young wife what he had said and done, and implored her to disguise her beauty by some ugly dress or silly manner, that he might be safe from the King's anger. She promised that she would; but she was a proud woman, who would far rather have been a queen than the wife of a courtier. She dressed herself in her best dress, and adorned herself with her richest jewels; ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... about as comfortable as a restless genius could be—that is, I should have been so had it not been for the damp and frigid influence of Aunt Sarah, who sympathised neither with genius nor youth, and certainly not with the two in combination. Twenty times a day she grieved me by calling me "silly little boy," and twenty times a day she exasperated me by reminding Harry, and, through him, me, that "little boys should ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... fifteen, when I overheard a young lady say I was growing pretty. I went to my mirror and spent some moments in unalloyed happiness and triumph. Then I thought, "Pretty face, the worms will eat you. All the prettiest girls I know are silly, but you shall never make a fool of me. Helen's beauty ruined Troy. Cleopatra was a wretch. So if you are pretty, I will ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... I did not look very silly? My lord, smiling, and gazing at me from head to foot; Lord Jackey grinning and laughing, like an oaf, as I then, in my spite, thought. Indeed the countess said, encouragingly to me, but severely ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... trusted him to carry out neatly whatever he undertook. Even over that he compelled my angry admiration. So neat! the fiend, the devil, he had got the better of me before I had had the chance to put up even the feeblest struggle. I curse myself now for my silly bravado in accompanying him when he asked me. I might have known I wasn't a match for him. But I'll be even with him yet," he said, his nervous hands fumbling at his collar, "I'll be even with him yet; I'll bide my time," and ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... distinguished from our naval, plans are permitted practically to ignore the possibility. Compulsion or no compulsion, those plans will be the same. They will be unaffected by any amount of invasion-scaring, and therefore to try to foster pessimism in the public by alarums about invasion is both silly and naughty. ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various
... who were then at the head of our Government. The emigrants, who, as it has been truly said, had neither learned nor forgotten anything, came back with all the absurd pretensions of Coblentz. Their silly vanity reminded one of a character in one of Voltaire's novels who is continually saying, "Un homme comme moi!" These people were so engrossed with their pretended merit that they were blind to everything else. They not only disregarded the wishes and the wants ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... silly poets joyne, To fill the world with vain and strange conceits, One brings the stuff, the other stamps the coyne Which breeds nought else but glosses of deceits. Thus painters Cupid paint, thus poets doe A naked god, blind, young, with ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume I. • Theophilus Cibber
... Galitzin was clever, I was wrong; he has a kind heart, and is very fond of me. Now that he has lost his mother, I shall be more kind to him. He is a person one can depend upon; his letters are silly productions. Those Russians have always ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... me with its continual fog-horn, and I thought I would write to the owner (a small local dairy-farmer) to see if he could manage to find another field in which to batten this cow, where it could moo till it broke its silly tonsils for all I should care; so I indited this ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 28th, 1920 • Various
... to-day the girl who will be your wife. How do you want her to be treated by the boys who are her school-companions? Do you like to think that they are rough with her, or playing at lovering with her? Is it a pleasant thought that she is allowing them to caress her or write her silly ...
— Almost A Man • Mary Wood-Allen
... philosophical smile with which doctors and nurses—and indeed, sometimes, anybody who happens to be feeling pretty well himself—console, or exasperate, suffering humanity. "A very good thing the poor silly child did come to me!" That was the form her thoughts took. For although Dr. Mary Arkroyd was, and knew herself to be, no dazzling genius at her profession—in moments of candor she would speak of ...
— The Secret of the Tower • Hope, Anthony
... imagine, if we like, that there is nothing beyond the village limits, and nothing in it but that which relates to the village. We have the right to be silly, if we wish to be. And it is no sign of wisdom to say that there is a county beyond, but that the county boundaries end all, and only village and county politics may be studied. The European who believed—no ...
— Ancient and Modern Physics • Thomas E. Willson
... Mr. Busby's proposed means of checkmating a rival. In the words of Governor Gipps, this "silly and unauthorized act was a paper pellet fired off" at the hero of an even more pretentious fiasco. An adventurer of French parentage, a certain Baron de Thierry, had proclaimed himself King of New Zealand, and through the agency of missionary ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... "Don't be silly!" exclaimed Betty, stilling the wild beating of her own heart by the reflection that she must be brave for the ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Florida - Or, Wintering in the Sunny South • Laura Lee Hope
... "Oh, don't be silly!" admonished Cis, apprehensive, but calm, being buoyed up by hope based upon solid information. "Didn't I tell you, Johnnie, to 'wait till Mr. Perkins finds out'? Well, we waited, tied to the table like two thieves, or something. ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... by the billy-goated dispositioned, vulgar plebeian, who could no more be made to read cold, scientific, ungarnished facts than you can make an unwilling horse drink at the watering-trough. Human weakness and perversity is silly, but it is sillier to ignore that it exists. So, for the sake of boring and driving a few solid facts into the otherwise undigesting and unthinking, as well as primarily obdurate understanding of the untutored ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... has occurred in this case must ever occur in similar cases. Human nature will not change. In any future great national trial, compared with the men of this, we shall have as weak and as strong, as silly and as wise, as bad and as good. Let us therefore study the incidents in this as philosophy to learn wisdom from and none of them as wrongs to be avenged.... Now that the election is over, may ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... general, the quantities in which Mrs. Lowder dealt. He would have liked as well to ask her how feasible she supposed it for a poor young man to resemble her at any point; but he had after all soon enough perceived that he was doing as she wished by letting his wonder show just a little as silly. He was conscious moreover of a small strange dread of the results of discussion with her—strange, truly, because it was her good nature, not her asperity, that he feared. Asperity might have made him angry—in which ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James |
