"Stupid" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... o'clock came, I was roused by the noise of dismissal for the two hours for dinner. I staggered out, still stupid with sleep, and whom should I find watching for me by the door-post ...
— Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood • George MacDonald
... attempt, but that it is better than Boyd's. His mind was a tolerable specimen of filigree work,—rather elegant, and very feeble. All that can be said for his best works is that they are neat. All that can be said against his worst is that they are stupid. He might have translated Metastasio tolerably. But he was utterly unable to do ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... this mass of long hair there is a curious line of separation running transversely across the back of the neck. The front division falls forward over the crown, so as to overhang the eyes—thus imparting to the physiognomy of the animal a heavy, stupid appearance. The other portion flaps back, forming a thick mane or hunch upon the shoulders. In old individuals the hair becomes greatly elongated; and hanging down almost to the ground on both flanks, and along ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid
... said, there could be nothing free from Transience, Constancy should be a gross mistake of the ignorant; if even gods have to die, Eternity should be no more than a stupid dream of the vulgar; if all phenomena be flowing and changing, there could be no constant noumena underlying them. It therefore follows that all things in the universe are empty and unreal. This ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... all these years, tracing your face on rocks and sand-beds of my hills, hanging my prayers to every blossoming tree? Come, you are mine at last; here is your master! We will escape together while the stupid old ones sleep! Come, soul of my ...
— The Dragon Painter • Mary McNeil Fenollosa
... had a rather stormy venture. All the old arguments and agreements had to be gone over. Men unaccustomed to business are quick in prosperity and stupid in adversity. They only had three-quarter wages: why should they be called upon to lose beside? It was little enough, and waiting five years,—and no one knew,—the whole thing might go to smash another year! A few wished, with an oath, that they were well out of it. They would never be bamboozled ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... tell that stupid Jack, that if he doesn't want to offend me so that I'll never, never forgive him, he is to bring his slate and pencil over here after supper this evening. And you'll come, too, with your geography. Yours truly, ...
— The Hoosier School-boy • Edward Eggleston
... Cupid Who made our days so bright; But he has grown so stupid We gladly say good-night. And if he wakens tender And fond, and fair as when He filled our lives with splendor, We'll ...
— Maurine and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... stupid not to think of that before. There can hardly be two men so singularly alike. I have come to ask you, Mrs. Merton, if you can spare me for two or ...
— Luke Walton • Horatio Alger
... is not by any attempt to do away directly with the actually existing class distinctions and advantages, as if everybody could have the same sort of work or lead the same sort of life (which none of my hearers are stupid enough to suppose), but by turning of Class Interests into Class Functions or duties. What I mean is, that each class should be urged by the surrounding conditions to perform its particular work under the strong pressure of responsibility to the nation at large; that our public affairs ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... that Lady May was married in," said Raffles, "and that disappeared out of the room she changed in, while it rained confetti on the steps, I'll present it to her instead of the one she lost.... It was stupid to keep these old gold spoons, valuable as they are; they made the difference in the weight.... Here we have probably the Kenworthy diamonds.... I don't know the history of these pearls.... This looks like one ...
— Raffles - Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... him—such were Mr Gresham's necessities—during the lifetime of the last old incumbent. Miss Oriel was in every respect a nice neighbour; she was good-humoured, lady-like, lively, neither too clever nor too stupid, belonging to a good family, sufficiently fond of this world's good things, as became a pretty young lady so endowed, and sufficiently fond, also, of the other world's good things, as became the mistress of a ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope
... Territories, presenting great variations in climate and in the kind and quality of their soils. Among the Indians upon these several reservations there exist the most marked differences in natural traits and disposition and in their progress toward civilization. While some are lazy, vicious, and stupid, others are industrious, peaceful, and intelligent; while a portion of them are self-supporting and independent, and have so far advanced in civilization that they make their own laws, administered ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland
... Father Peter, Dmitri's letters must have gone astray—perhaps the new postman can't read; he looks stupid enough, and Dmitri, why, he was the best fellow in the village. Do you remember how he shot the bear at the barn in the ...
— Vera - or, The Nihilists • Oscar Wilde
... said Ganglere: How comes it that summer is so hot, but the winter so cold? Har answered: A wise man would not ask such a question, for all are able to tell this; but if you alone have become so stupid that you have not heard of it, then I would rather forgive you for asking unwisely once than that you should go any longer in ignorance of what you ought to know. Svasud is the name of him who is father of summer, and he lives such a life of enjoyment, that everything that is mild ...
— The Younger Edda - Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda • Snorre
... Biddy had seen the struggle in which the Senor Montefalderon had been lost, in a sort of stupid horror. Both had screamed, as was their wont, though neither probably suspected the truth. But the fell designs of Spike extended to them, as well as to those whom he had already destroyed. Now the boat was in deep water, running along the margin of the reef, the waves were much increased in magnitude, ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... stupid little creature, but she had a very good heart. She was very red-haired, but, beautiful as an angel from head ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... "That stupid Republic of yours makes me feel queasy. We sha'n't be able to carve a capon in peace, because we shall find the agrarian ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... brain is apprehensively busy with secret conjectures in which her husband even may not participate, is a species of torture which the average bride submits to with the best grace possible because social custom dictates the stupid programme. ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... Eve was like Matilda Jane. The little pimple on her nose—her little, sweet, tip-tilted nose—how beautiful it is. Her bright eyes flash with temper now and then; how piquant is a temper in a woman. William is a dear old stupid, how lovable stupid men can be—especially when wise enough to love us. William does not shine in conversation; how we hate a magpie of a man. William's chin is what is called receding, just the sort of chin a beard looks well on. Bless you, Oberon darling, for that drug; rub it on our ...
— The Second Thoughts of An Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome
... Is an indication of the (inward) virtue. People have the saying, 'There is no wise man who is not (also) stupid.' The stupidity of the ordinary man Is determined by his (natural) defects. The stupidity of the wise man Is from his doing ...
— The Shih King • James Legge
... necessarily a celestial abode, and that its inmates do not inevitably enjoy consolatory peace. She found feminine spite there of the same texture with that wreaked by worldly women upon each other, and she notes the cruel taunts which good, old, ugly, and learned sister Sophia received from some stupid nuns, who, she says, "were fond of exposing her defects because they did not possess her talents." But her devotional fervor did not abate. She fainted under the feeling of awe in the act of her ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... apparent stolidity, the Indian is not so stupid as to be misled by talk like this. With a full knowledge of the situation— forced upon him by various events—the badinage of the brilliant militario does not for a moment blind him. Circumstances have given him enough insight into Uraga's character and position to know that the tatter's motives ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... however, staring vacantly at the floor; with a lustreless and stupid smile. A spectacle of such deep degradation, of such abject hopelessness, of such a miserable downfall, that she put her hands before her face and turned away, lest he should see how much it ...
— The Chimes • Charles Dickens
... the world's greatest poet, was intended, no doubt, as a warning to some stupid sexton, lest he should empty the grave and give the honored place to some amiable gentleman who had given more ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... Rupert found us satisfactory pupils, for he never did give up the lectures in a huff, though he sometimes threatened to do so, when I asked stupid questions, ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... I never used to be able to get along at school. I don't know why it was, but I was always at the foot of the class. I used to feel that my teachers never sympathized with me, and that my father thought that I was stupid, and at last I almost decided that I must really be a dunce. My mother was always kind, always sympathetic, and she never misunderstood or misjudged me. My mother was the making of me. She was so true, so sure of me; and I felt I had someone to live for, some one I must ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford
... all," said Herbert. "Well, now, that's jolly; I thought you were going to be a good-for-nothing stupid creature. Come now, say it again; but give us ...
— The Cockatoo's Story • Mrs. George Cupples
... vision of Duncan Farll's hard, stupid face, and impenetrable steel head; and of himself being kicked out of the house, or delivered over to a policeman, or in some subtler way unimaginably insulted. Could he confront Duncan Farll? Was a hundred and forty thousand pounds and the dignity of the British nation worth ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... long ago, or he never could have written his history, stupid," said the mate, "but whoever they are ...
— Peter Trawl - The Adventures of a Whaler • W. H. G. Kingston
... cattle and moving herds in the field. My farmer describes how they attended him one foggy day, as he was mowing in the meadow with a mowing-machine. It had been foggy for two days, and the swallows were very hungry, and the insects stupid and inert. When the sound of his machine was heard, the swallows appeared and attended him like a brood of hungry chickens. He says there was a continued rush of purple wings over the "cut-bar," and just where it was causing the grass to tremble and fall. ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs
... stupid thing, in Swan's opinion, which he had not done was to let Lone go on holding his tongue. He had forced the issue that morning. He had wanted to make Lone talk, had hoped for a weakening and a confession. Instead he had learned a good deal which ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... there," rejoined Galen Albret, "the point is that I intend to keep it. I've had you sent out, but you have been too stupid or too obstinate to take the hint. Now I have to warn you in person. I shall send you out once more, but this time you must promise me not to meddle with ...
— Conjuror's House - A Romance of the Free Forest • Stewart Edward White
... bound to it that gave her the expression of struggle. Chains held her when she wanted to be free. She was one too many here. Before her was Archdale's face as he had looked at Katie, and between these two a stupid woman whom she had no patience with, whom she hated—herself. And now there might be coming an added pain that she had brought. She did not care especially for Archdale's pain, except that it ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2 • Various
... believe that children abandoned in infancy in a savage country, and surviving this abandonment, to grow up in a state of nature, living on herbs and fruits, and sustaining existence as other wild animals, would be stupid, without language, without intellect, and with no greater instinct than that which governs the brute creation. We can conceive nothing reduced to a more savage condition; with cannibal propensities, an ungovernable ferocity, or a timid apprehension, there can be but a link that separates ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... always patting ourselves on the back and fancying ourselves mighty clever; but we're not. We're asses—always slipping and tumbling about, and when not doing that, running down the wrong road and butting our stupid heads against posts or walls. Asses, all of ...
— The Hero of Garside School • J. Harwood Panting
... some day, Paul, how amusing it is to make a fool of the world by depriving it of the secret of one's affections. I derive an immense pleasure in escaping from the stupid jurisdiction of the crowd, which knows neither what it wants, nor what one wants of it, which takes the means for the end, and by turns curses and adores, elevates and destroys! What a delight to impose emotions on it and receive none from it, to tame ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... wonderful eyes. Bauer's were like that. She could not help wondering what sort of people his parents were and what his home life was. The stubborn feeling prompted her to say to herself, "I'll make him speak first. He doesn't need to be so stupid. And besides it is not gentlemanly in him always to wait for ...
— The High Calling • Charles M. Sheldon
... spar doesn't sound interesting, but it was; it got quite exciting towards the end as the wiry cavalry colonel, hero of many a stricken field, knocked out all comers, young or old. Egg and spoon races and threading needles were a little stupid, but what tableaux the groups of fair women made, with the bright dresses and complexions, and the jolly brown young men, all in the soft light that was filtering through the awning and blazing up from under its ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... the natives must be!" said George; "for they apparently sleep as regularly in their own beds as any stupid Christian in England." ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... at last agreed upon. We all awaited the arrival of the two ladies in great suspense. The obligation imposed on us by the queen, of being intellectual at all hazards, had the effect of conjuring up a somewhat embarrassed and stupid expression to our faces. We presented the appearance of actors on the stage looking at each other, while awaiting the rise of the curtain. Jests and bon mots followed each other in rapid succession until the arrival of the carriage recalled ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... Jean protested. "You've done for her anyway. But you're wrong in thinking her stupid. She only comes to The Rigs when she isn't occupied with smart friends and is rather dull—I don't see her in her more exalted moments; but I assure you, after she has done talking about 'the County,' and after the full blast ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... "How stupid!" exclaimed Miss Melville, suddenly stopping, and turning round on the pivot of the music stool till she commanded a full view of the drawing-room. "I thought you would all be dancing by this time. There is no use in playing to such inanimate mortals. ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... the day Poppy's presents came she did not even stop for a moment to look at the wax dolls. What stupid creatures they seemed to her now! Her babies could open and shut their eyes, and none of these ...
— Poppy's Presents • Mrs O. F. Walton
... not think Frisky Squirrel was stupid, when I tell you that the door was open all this time. It was open just the smallest crack, for Farmer Green's wife hadn't quite closed it when she went downstairs. Frisky had been too frightened to notice it. Besides, the attic had been ...
— The Tale of Frisky Squirrel • Arthur Scott Bailey
... canoe, and not without nearly oversetting it, heavy-laden as she was—when I whispers, 'You'd best take a paddle here, Mas'r Harry,' when I felt two hands at my throat, my head bent back, a knee forced into my chest, and there in that black darkness I lay for a few minutes quite stupid, calling myself all the fools I could think of for helping someone on board that I knew now was ...
— The Golden Magnet • George Manville Fenn
... "Look at the stupid Frenchman!" I heard a brave say. "For all his red coat, and his manners, he cannot catch as well ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... that degrades every human emotion to the plane of utility and purpose, I heartily endorse. His method of achieving the ideal seems to me too full of red tape. However, I welcome every effort against the conspiracy of ignorance, hypocrisy and stupid prudery, against the ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 1, March 1906 • Various
... System of Europe [general Diplomatic Dance of Europe, suddenly brought to a whirl by such changes of the music]; a new arena (CARRIERE) came to open itself,—and one must have been either without address, or else buried in stupid somnolence (ENGOURDISSEMENT), not to profit by an opportunity so advantageous. I had read Bojardo's fine Allegory: [Signifies only, "seize opportunity;" but here ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... his clamor for a job; the satisfied, brutal egotism of Brome Porter, who lived as if life were a huge poker game; the overfed, red-cheeked Caspar, whom he remembered to have seen only once before, when the young polo captain was stupid drunk; the silly young cub of a Hitchcock. Even the girl was one of them. If it weren't for the women, the men would not be so keen on the scent for gain. The women taught the men how to spend, created the needs for their wealth. ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... asked them if they had ever been to Mull. 'We have passed it in the Clansman' said the elder boy. 'And do you know one Sir Keith Macleod there?' I asked. 'Oh no, ma'am,' said he, staring at me with his clear blue eyes as if I was a very stupid person, 'The Macleods are from Skye.' 'But surely one of them may live in Mull,' I suggested. 'The Macleods are from Skye,' he maintained, 'and my papa was at Dunvegan last year.' Then came the business of choosing the toys; and the smaller child would have a boat, ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... Had you been something of the man I thought, I might have gone with you and helped to baffle the police; but you were not. You were very dull and played a stupid part. When you thought you had won and I was in your power, I knew you for ...
— Lister's Great Adventure • Harold Bindloss
... as in so many other regions of life, upon your guide. If he is selfish, or surly, or stupid, you will have a bad time. But if he is an Adirondacker of the best old-fashioned type,—now unhappily growing more rare from year to year,—you will find him an inimitable companion, honest, faithful, skilful and cheerful. He is as independent as a prince, and the gilded youths and finicking ...
— Little Rivers - A Book Of Essays In Profitable Idleness • Henry van Dyke
... "Why how stupid of me!" Bet tried to look innocent. "Was that there all the time? Imagine me not seeing it!" There was remorse in her voice but a merry twinkle in her eyes ...
— The Merriweather Girls in Quest of Treasure • Lizette M. Edholm
... that instead of buying myself food for luncheon, I ate molasses and gingerbread that all but turned my stomach; and I was so eager to learn my law that I did not take my sleep when I could get it. The result was that I was stupid at my tasks, moody, melancholy, and so sensitive that my employer's natural dissatisfaction with my work put me into agonies of shame and despair of myself. I became, as the boys say, "dopy." I remember that one night, after I had scrubbed the floors ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... religious ceremonies. Merker, who observed him secretly during the early days which he spent in jail, declared that he was "in all respects like a child." Meyer, of the school at Ansbach, found him "idle, stupid, and vain." Dr. Osterhausen found a deviation from the normal in the shape of his legs, which made walking difficult, but Caspar never wearied of riding ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... thought that a stupid saying," remarked the Brat, as he helped himself to a ginger-nut with pink icing. "I have my cake, and when I have eaten it, ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... on cloudy winter days From dawn to dusk and I soap heads, Shave them and powder them and speak Indifferent words, stupid, foolish. Most heads are completely shut, They sleep limply. And others read again And look slowly through long lids, As though they had sucked everything dry. Still others open the red cracks of their mouths wide And tell jokes. For my part, I smile courteously. ...
— The Verse of Alfred Lichtenstein • Alfred Lichtenstein
... not a babe." She replied to his mocking, literally. "Even if I am stupid and commonplace, I may have ...
— Literary Love-Letters and Other Stories • Robert Herrick
... cordially with the two men who are staring about the room in embarrassment. Carmody has very evidently been drinking. His voice is thick and his face puffed and stupid. Nicholls' manner is that of one who is accomplishing a necessary but disagreeable duty with the best grace possible, but is frightfully eager to get it over and done with. Carmody's condition embarrasses him acutely and when he glances ...
— The Straw • Eugene O'Neill
... and going to speak: but he stamped with his foot, and said, Begone! I tell you: I cannot bear this stupid romantic folly. ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... thinking very much about spiritual things, things I mean beyond the material, those great forces which must be all around us, and I have wondered if we are not perhaps too ignorant yet to upset any laws. Perhaps I am stupid—I don't know really. I have only been wondering—but perhaps there are powerful currents connected with laws, whether they are just or unjust, simply because of the force of people's thoughts for ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... Often this stupid pondering over a book would madden the two brothers. It irritated them till they would move the lantern away from him. But he always followed the light with a sigh and uncomplainingly settled down again. Sometimes they even snatched the book out of ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand
... or three thousand people in the world," continued Berkeley, "supremely worth knowing. Why shouldn't I know them?—— I will! Everybody knows two or three thousand people,—mostly very stupid people,—or, rather, he lets them know him. Why shouldn't he use some choice in the matter? Why not know Thackeray and Carlyle, Lord Palmerston and the Pope, and the Emperor of China and all the great statesmen, authors, African explorers, military commanders, ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 8 • Various
... nothing—genius is nothing—but no! that is blasphemous. It is we that are nothing—if not stupid. Dullness is the universe. The grasshoppers are too faint to sing, the birds sit still on the boughs, waiting for the leaves to fan them. Children are wilted into silence and slumberous nonentity; boys do not bathe to-day—they ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various
... girl, brought from the alms-house, now did the drudgery of the family. Abner Dimock had grown penurious, and not one cent of money was given for comfort in that house, scarce for need. The girl was stupid and rude, but she worked for her board,—recommendation enough in Mr. Dimock's eyes; and so hard work was added to the other burdens loaded upon his silent wife. And soon came another, all-mysterious, but from its very mystery a deeper fear. Abner ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... her, without a doubt," he said slowly. For a moment he was like one struck stupid. Slowly he turned to the dock, looking up and down its orderly but unprepossessing clutter. Dim lights shone here and there, and a few hands were at work at the farther end. The dull silence, the unresponsive preoccupation ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... physically of the membership, he was the most active of all, ever running full tilt into every abuse or fault or complaint that might help to explain this unwonted, and, indeed, utterly purposeless and stupid incident of a British community. In my capacity as chairman, I appreciated Fawkner's untiring, or more properly, unyielding spirit, and under travelling fatigues, too, of no mean trial even to younger men. For the Colossus of Rhodes, as my energetic friend, ...
— Personal Recollections of Early Melbourne & Victoria • William Westgarth
... necessity, that he is base, interested, dissimulating, without honour, in a word that he has the vices of the state of which he is a citizen. Almost every where he is deceived; encouraged in ignorance; prevented from cultivating his reason; of course he must be stupid, irrational, and wicked almost every where he sees vice applauded, and crime honoured; thence he concludes vice to be a good; virtue, only a useless sacrifice of himself: almost every where he is miserable, therefore he injures his fellow-men in a fruitless attempt ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach
... I have seen more about returned goods than you have," I said, "as I have been in the store so long, and see every package that comes in. I do get my back up over some of the stupid things the average retailer will do. It never seems to enter his head to drop the house a card and await their instructions about the goods that are unsatisfactory, but he fancies he is showing how smart he is by whacking them back at once, and always by express, no matter how ...
— A Man of Samples • Wm. H. Maher
... any inequality of ground and in half an hour find a hundred or two private lawns graded—from the house to each boundary line—on a single falling curve, or, in plain English, a hump. The best reason why this curve is not artistic, not pleasing, but stupid, is that it is not natural and gains nothing by being unnatural. All gardening is a certain conquest of Nature, and even when "formal" should interfere with her own manner and custom as slightly as is required by the necessities of the case—the ...
— The Amateur Garden • George W. Cable
... sure it will be very stupid," said Macloud. "It depends on how much you liked this froth and try, we have here. The want to and can't—the aping the ways and manners of those who have had wealth for generations, and are well-born, ...
— In Her Own Right • John Reed Scott
... that is what you get by walking with that stupid Humphreys," said Oriana. "She knows no better than to blab to any one who will be at the trouble to seem sweet upon her, though she may get nothing ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... who doubts now the correctness of that vote? The law admitting those territories passed without any proviso. Is there a slave, or will there ever be one, in either of those territories? Why, there is not a man in the United States so stupid as not to see, at this moment, that such a thing was wholly unnecessary, and that it was only calculated to irritate and to offend. I am not one who is disposed to create irritation, or give offence among brethren, or to break up fraternal ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... and be unable to escape from their enemies. The Caribs abstained from the flesh of pigs lest it should cause them to have small eyes like pigs; and they refused to partake of tortoises from a fear that if they did so they would become heavy and stupid like the animal. Among the Fans of West Africa men in the prime of life never eat tortoises for a similar reason; they imagine that if they did so, their vigour and fleetness of foot would be gone. But old men may eat tortoises freely, because having already ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... view of those large classes of human nature he did include. His sympathetic insight was both serious and humorous; and he thus equally escaped the intolerance of taste and the intolerance of intelligence. What we would call the worst criminals and the most stupid fools were, as mirrored in his mind, fairly dealt with; every opportunity was afforded them to justify their right to exist; their words, thoughts, and acts were viewed in relation to their circumstances and character, so that he made them inwardly known, as well as outwardly perceived. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various
... is stupid to pray all your life, and not to pray now when we have nothing to hope for except through the goodness of Providence." He dropped upon his knees with a rigid, military back, but his grizzled, unshaven chin upon his chest. The Frenchman looked at his kneeling companions, and then his eyes travelled ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle
... tried the chord of vanity, of her love of popularity. The people called her the beautiful Duchess—why not let history name her the great? But the mention of history was unfortunate. It reminded her of her lesson-books, and of the stupid Greeks and Romans, whose dates she could never recall. She hoped she should never be anything so dull as an historical personage! And besides, greatness was for the men—it was enough for a princess to be virtuous. And she looked as edifying as ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... Ville-Handry's only daughter—the heiress of many millions, brought up, so to say, in a hothouse, according to the stupid custom of modern society—knew nothing at all of life, of its bitter realities, its struggles, and its sufferings. She ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... the strength you have, and we will go to Strasburg in time to show those stupid people that, if it should be necessary, we live near enough to them to give them ...
— Bertha • Mary Hazelton Wade
... plenty of common sense, a great power of resistance, shrewdness. By means of these, you have been able to subdue the tyranny of others: can you not escape from that of your failings? Your life has adapted itself to an evil and stupid environment; it must now adapt itself to the environment of ...
— The Choice of Life • Georgette Leblanc
... in Hazlitt precociously in the study of human nature. He characterized some of his schoolmates disdainfully as "fit only for fighting like stupid dogs and cats," and at the age of twelve, while on a visit, he communicated to his father a caustic sketch of some English ladies who "require an Horace or a Shakespeare to describe them," and whose "ceremonial unsociality" made him wish he were back in America. His metaphysical ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... were more like Plumbe And not so much like me— I hate to see the paper hum When it should stupid be. For when a lot of wit and rhyme Appears upon our pages, I know too well my men in time Will ask a ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... the Hindu honour, influence, power, and culture. In his heart of hearts the Hindu highly respects, and is always ready to listen to, that man of the West who is true to himself and stands before him for what he is and for what he teaches. The ordinary Hindu is not stupid enough to be deceived as to a man's nationality or true position in life because of his change of clothing or food. Indeed, to nine-tenths of all Hindus, such a change of habits, on the part of a European, would mean nothing else than that he had lost caste among his own people ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones
... Isuppose, will doubt that we have here in the stories of the Pacatantra and Hitopade{s}a the first germs of La Fontaine's fable.[7] But how did that fable travel all the way from India to France? How did it doff its Sanskrit garment and don the light dress of modern French? How was the stupid Brahman born again as the brisk milkmaid, "cotillon simple et ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... trampling of dim forms swaying in the fight, the roaring of the gale, and the incessant crash of heavy spray made up a ghastly pandemonium. It was an orgy of terror, of wild abandon, of hopeless striving on the edge of the pit—a stupid madness at the best, as the ship's life-boats on the port side were on the spar deck; in their panic the men were endeavoring to lower a dingy. Yet Courtenay saw that discipline was regaining its influence. He thought to inspire ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... anything at all about the early morning of the next day, the 9th. We were dreadfully tired, and I suppose we slept late, and then lounged about, with nothing to do, yet, in a listless, stupid state. Everything was quiet around us, and nothing to attract attention, or fix it in mind. About mid-day, I recollect noticing bodies of troops, a regiment, a brigade, or two, moving about, here ...
— From the Rapidan to Richmond and the Spottsylvania Campaign - A Sketch in Personal Narration of the Scenes a Soldier Saw • William Meade Dame
... Though shameless as he is, to face these eyes Is what he dares not: if he dares he dies;) Tell him, all terms, all commerce I decline, Nor share his council, nor his battle join; For once deceiv'd, was his; but twice were mine, No—let the stupid prince, whom Jove deprives Of sense and justice, run where frenzy drives; His gifts are hateful: kings of such a kind Stand but as slaves before a noble mind, Not though he proffer'd all himself possess'd, And all his rapine could from others wrest: ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... threw down the cards and said: "You had better do what he wants. I can't manage him." Perhaps she had it in her mind that she would have no tiresome tutor on the morrow, while I should be obliged to be back to those stupid lessons. ...
— The Hungry Stones And Other Stories • Rabindranath Tagore
... and delineators of human character, Homer, Cervantes, Shakespeare, Goeethe, Scott, and the rest, cheer and invigorate us even in the vivid representation of our common humanity in its meanest, most stupid, most criminal forms. Now comes a woman endowed not only with their large discourse of reason, their tolerant views of life, and their intimate knowledge of the most obscure recesses of the human heart and brain, but with a portion of that rich, imaginative humor which softens ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... the day of which I speak, I was awakened by one of these stupid, perverse birds, which must have been in the cedars on the knoll close behind the house, and which disturbed my very soul by his ceaseless and melancholy hooting. For some reason it affected me more than commonly, and I lay for a long time nearly on the ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... Bon-Mots of Dr. Johnson[1266]. JOHNSON, 'Sir, it is a mighty impudent thing.' BOSWELL. 'Pray, Sir, could you have no redress if you were to prosecute a publisher for bringing out, under your name, what you never said, and ascribing to you dull stupid nonsense, or making you swear profanely, as many ignorant relaters of your bon-mots do[1267]?' JOHNSON. 'No, Sir; there will always be some truth mixed with the falsehood, and how can it be ascertained how much is true and how much is false? Besides, Sir, what damages would a jury ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... they emerged upon the garden at the right of his own house. The flowers were thinning out fast, but the place was still gay with marigolds and other late blossoms. As he passed the kitchen door he was aware of the maid's gaping face of stupid surprise, and he called out curtly to her: "Is my mother in ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... "Oh, how stupid!" she exclaimed. "Of course, this is not your first visit to Dornlitz. Yet, it's a queer coincidence that you should have both the family name and the ...
— The Colonel of the Red Huzzars • John Reed Scott
... caught her by the arm. "Oh, hush! I was only joking," she said hastily. "I was trying to balance Manley's wish for fifty thousand dollars, don't you see? It was stupid of me, I know." She laughed unconvincingly. "Let me guess what the surprise is. First, is it large ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower
... the colonel's recitals have been, this letter conveys a piece of information more surprising than anything we have heard this day. That stupid fellow who spoiled our champagne has come in for the inheritance of ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover
... anecdote. After plenty of other rappings and noises (I noticed by the way that all the metal things in the room, as castors and cruets—it was a dining-room—and wine coolers and bronze chandelier, were clicked and clanged), and after the usual stupid alphabet questions and answers had been exhibited; after also the heavy mahogany table on five substantial pillars had been miraculously moved about the room and tilted, as we failed to effect at the finale when we tried; all at once a thundering knock quite shook the table and ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... fellow has heaped provocations, insults, and affronts on you, or something to that effect? He has done the same by me. He is made of venomous insults and affronts, from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot. Are you so hopeful or so stupid, as not to know that he and the other will treat your application with contempt, and light their ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... never a feast like that of the folk of Vaiau. All day long they ate with the resolute greed of brutes, And turned from the pigs to the fish, and again from the fish to the fruits, And emptied the vessels of sauce, and drank of the kava deep; Till the young lay stupid as stones, and the strongest nodded to sleep. Sleep that was mighty as death and blind as a moonless night Tethered them hand and foot; and their souls were drowned, and the light Was cloaked from their eyes. Senseless together, the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... so much obliged to you. I was so convinced that the bladders were with the leaves that I never thought of removing the moss, and this was very stupid of me. The great solid bladder-like swellings almost on the surface are wonderful objects, but are not the true bladders. These I found on the roots near the surface, and down to a depth of two inches in the sand. They ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... did not write to return thanks for this cordial invitation. I felt insulted to be thought stupid enough to ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)
... this respect, for the simple- looking lad who stood there staring at him so solemnly. Yes, diplomacy was undoubtedly the way out of this unfortunate scrape; the Englishman must be made to realise that the capture of Nombre was a stupid mistake, out of which neither honour nor profit was to be gained; and once convinced of this, he would perhaps withdraw himself and his forces peaceably. These thoughts flashed through Don Sebastian's brain while George ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood
... person on his knee, the whole garnished with the epigraph: Scenes de la Vie Cachee. They seem to have given him, personally, a very unnecessary annoyance, and indeed he was always rather sensitive to criticism. This kind of stupid libel will never cease to be devised by the envious, swallowed by the vulgar, and simply neglected by the wise. But Balzac's peculiarities, both of life and of work, lent themselves rather fatally to a ...
— The Human Comedy - Introductions and Appendix • Honore de Balzac
... selling cast-off clothing and she was good to us,—and when father came in very drunk, she would take us children into her little place to be out of the way. So I hunted her up; and then, Mother Agnes, I did a very wrong thing. She is old and stupid, and very poor, and I could not take food and lodging with her for nothing,—so I gave her my Orphanage dress. She was pleased with it, and said it was worth quite ten shillings, and gave me a ragged old dress in exchange,—and something to buy a bit of print with to run up ...
— Daybreak - A Story for Girls • Florence A. Sitwell
... however are not of the least Use to themselves in the Conduct of their Lives. And hence it is certain, that tho the Gentlemen of a pleasant and witty Turn of Mind often make the industrious Merchant, and grave Persons of all Professions, the Subjects of their Raillery, and expose them as stupid Creatures, not supportable in good Company; yet these in their Turn believe they have as great a right, as indeed they have, to reproach the others for want of Industry, good Sense, and regular Oeconomy, much more valuable Talents than those, which any mere Wit can boast ...
— Essay upon Wit • Sir Richard Blackmore
... "How stupid! The police are a truly wonderful body of men," she went on with enthusiasm. "They look so splendid. I saw some of them as I came along. But never mind them now. About this letter. What's ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... the habit of examining evidence, they were content to accept ideas that threw a pleasant glamour on life. But the coming of Jimmy Simpson altered this agreeable condition of mind. Jimmy was one of those masterful stupid boys who excel at games and physical contests, and triumph over intellectual problems by sheer braggart ignorance. From the first he regarded George with contempt, and when he heard him telling his stories he did ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... He shook his head, and said at once, "I fear, if I could go, that I should be too late. That Pewsey doctor can kill much easier than I can cure. The taking of blood away at such a moment was most stupid, it was most damnable; he ought to have put blood into him, instead of taking it away. I fear, after that, there is no hopes. What says Bob Clare?" "I am sorry to say, sir, that you are too well agreed in your opinion; ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... the Man! Or, rather think some God! Dull stupid Maid, Hast thou not heard of something more than mortal! 'Twixt Human and Divine! our Country's Genius, Our young God of War! not heard ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... she were not unduly frivolous even for a child of six; for she would refuse to study unless she could have the doll she called Bishop Wright with her and pretend that she taught the lesson to him, finding him always stupid and loth to learn. He hoped for better things from her mind as she aged, watching anxiously for the buddings of reason and religion, praying daily that she should be increased in wisdom as in stature. He had become so used to the look of her mother ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... "This stupid insistence upon confining me to manual labor. I'm the single member on Ragnarok of the Athena Planning Board and surely you can see that this bumbling confusion of these people"—Bemmon indicated the hurrying, laboring men, women and children around them—"can be transformed ...
— Space Prison • Tom Godwin
... a trituration (H.) is made of this fungus, and its spores, rubbed up with inert sugar of milk powdered, and it proves an effective remedy against dull, stupid, sleepy headache, with passive itchy pimples about the skin. From five to ten grains of the trituration, diluted to the third decimal strength, should be given twice a day, with a little water, for two or ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... raises one question: "If the interests of your army or your people or yourself are at stake or you have to keep your word on one hand and your pledge word and treaty is on the other hand, which path will you take? Who can be stupid enough to hesitate in answering this question? In other words, treaties are to be kept when they promote your interest, and shamelessly broken when you ...
— The Blot on the Kaiser's 'Scutcheon • Newell Dwight Hillis
... been still half stupid with sleep and indigestion, and standing in the full blaze of this hot sun, he might have been rather struck by this last sentence. But he did have those disadvantages, and he saw in ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson
... theories about it. He could write an essay on the Understanding, but was unversed in Common-sense. His nature was more calm and normal than Shaftesbury's, but in their intellectual conclusions they were not dissimilar. The views about the common people which Sir William Berkeley expressed with stupid brutality, they stated with punctual elegance. They were well mated for the purpose in hand, and they performed it with due deliberation and sobriety. It was not until five years after the grant was made that the ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... to this proposal as unworthy of the Republic, and moves that Pitt be declared an enemy of the human race. This is at once approved as worthy of the humanity and dignity of the Convention. The decree, then, was obviously a device for shelving the stupid and bloodthirsty motion of Garnier. The whole discussion may be compared with Pitt's declaration to the House of Commons on 12th February 1793, that the war, though undoubtedly provoked by France, would never be waged by England for ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... presence of Vasudeva, "Do thou, O suta, say unto Dhritarashtra's son, in the presence of all the Kurus, and also in the hearing of that Suta's son, of foul tongue and wicked soul, of little sense, stupid reason, and of numbered days, who always desires to fight against me, and also in the hearing of those kings assembled for fighting against the Pandavas, and do thou see that all the words now uttered ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... let her come again, and I '11 let you off... only, please, don't show your stupid phiz inside my tent, and leave us in peace; do ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... isn't quite heaven yet, and you will take cold. Honestly, girls, isn't it a sort of wonderment to you how the people up there can employ their time? In spite of me I cannot help feeling that it must be rather stupid; think of never being able to lie down ...
— Four Girls at Chautauqua • Pansy
... gallant falsehood. What harm can be done thereby, and why cause her useless embarrassment? "We simply have to be polite as our race and clime understand politeness, and no one except a naive is really going to take this sort of thing seriously." To thank a stupid hostess for the pleasure she has not given, is loving one's neighbor as one's self. "I know only one person whom I could count on not to indulge herself in these conventional falsehoods, and she has never been able, so far as I know, ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake
... giving about two days, no end of little garments to alter and to make, with a husband whose clothes as well as himself have been neglected for three months, the garden to be covered up from the frost, shrubs to transplant, winter provisions to lay in and only one good-natured, stupid servant to help with all. This, Susan, ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... right, too," said Dolly, with a little pout. "You know too much, Bessie—I'm glad to find there's something you don't do right. You must she stupid about some things, just like the rest of us, if you lived on a farm and don't know how to pitch hay ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at Long Lake - Bessie King in Summer Camp • Jane L. Stewart
... a smart fellow!" exclaimed Captain Miles with much gusto. "You're worth all the rest of those stupid lubbers of mine boiled down together! Haul away now, Mr Marline," he added, looking up; "I think we've fixed the cow ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... "All the more reason, Stupid!" he said to the moth, as it flew away. "A man goes and gets a girl to care for him, and then he goes and plays some fool trick—like as not this chap had his sheet tied—and leaves her alone the rest of her life. Just look at this sweet old angel, ...
— Geoffrey Strong • Laura E. Richards
... is certainly stupid," she exclaimed. "Of course it isn't Weston Street; it's Weston Place, as the ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard
... stupid, so forgetful, so just like me not to have asked her more about it. She had been ill; the journey itself was more than she could stand; and then to have to carry the baby! She said it was not far, but perhaps she only said that to please ...
— Cecilia de Noel • Lanoe Falconer
... The man bowed, smiling in a stupid way, then began to withdraw, explaining that he was cleaning the hall, and hoping that he had not disturbed "monsieur." The detective closed the door, uncertain whether the man had been watching him or not. ...
— The Ivory Snuff Box • Arnold Fredericks
... worst of it," said the girl, with one of her sudden accesses of sweet candor. "I needn't have hurt him at all. I was stupid." She paused in her revelation. "But he was stupider," she declared vindictively; "so it serves ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams |
