"Graven image" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and repulsive under the flickering flame. Their lips muttered in monotonous chant a weird incantation which sent to my heart a chill of superstitious dread. High above the altar, blackened by the constantly ascending cloud of smoke, swayed uneasily a peculiar graven image of wood, hideous in disfigurement of form and diabolical of visage, appearing to float upon outspread wings, and gloating down upon us through eyes glittering ominously in the fire sheen. At either extremity of the apartment, where I supposed were the entrance and exit previously noted, stood ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... everything—in cheerfulness of demeanour, in suavity of voice, and in complete neglect of the use of strong potions—he was the absolute antithesis of his companions. Yet his path was not an easy one to tread, for over him he had the misfortune to have placed in authority a Chief Clerk who was a graven image of elderly insensibility and inertia. Always the same, always unapproachable, this functionary could never in his life have smiled or asked civilly after an acquaintance's health. Nor had any one ever seen him a whit different in the street or at his own home from what he was in the ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... any images whatever as an accessory of religious worship, which, next to the recognition of One only God, is the keystone of the Hebrew law:—"Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.—Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them" (Exodus, ...
— Chaldea - From the Earliest Times to the Rise of Assyria • Znade A. Ragozin
... Prospectors' Arms, for fear she'd think I wanted to break with her altogether, and yet I was never altogether comfortable in her company. It wasn't her fault, for she laid herself out to get round us all, even old Arizona Bill, who used to sit solemnly smoking, looking like an Indian chief or a graven image, until at last his brick-coloured, grizzled old face would break up all of a sudden, and he'd laugh like a youngster. As the days drew nigh Christmas I could see a restless expression in her face that I never saw before. ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... arrived. There was a handshake for the Colonel, and a word with two or three of the officers; then a quick scrutiny of the rank and file. For a moment—yea, more than a moment—keen Royal eyes rested upon Private M'Slattery, standing like a graven image, with his great chest straining the ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay
... thundered, the minies sang. One of the latter struck a tree above his head and severed a leafy twig. It came floating down, touched his shoulder like an accolade and rested on the pine needles by his foot. He gave it no attention, sitting like a graven image with clasped hands, listening to the South Carolinian's report. Hampton ceased to speak and waited. It was the height of the afternoon. He stood three minutes in silence, perhaps, then glanced toward the man on the log. Jackson's ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... given commandment concerning thee, that no more of thy name be sown; out of the house of thy gods will I cut off the graven image and the molten image; I will make thy grave; for thou ...
— Select Masterpieces of Biblical Literature • Various
... attempted. But how? In that he has been so bold as to prescribe and impose a worship besides, and without reverence of that which God has prescribed and imposed: For to do this, is, to make one's self a God. 'Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them': For he that thus ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... of rights, Mrs. Hunter, I love the girl; you do not. As remorselessly as a graven image you would sacrifice her on the ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... their heroism, self-sacrifice and virtues; no orator has pronounced a panegyric; no poet has embalmed their memory in song, and no novelist has taken their record for a fanciful story. Since their mission was a failure their memory is doomed to rest without marble monument or graven image. To the merciful and the just they will be ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... relapsed into silence as they cut for the deal. It was an education in the game to observe each man as he, metaphorically speaking, donned his mask of impassive reserve. As the game progressed any one of those four men might have been a graven image as far as the expression of countenance went. No word was spoken beyond "Raise you so and so"—"See you that." So keen, so ardent was the game that the stake might have been one of life and death. No money passed. Just slips ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... few seconds; that was a pretty stiff jolt. No Dark Place; who ever heard of such a thing? The eldest shoonoo rose, cradling his graven image in his arms, and ...
— Oomphel in the Sky • Henry Beam Piper
... and while we sat she touched up the town and Father nearly fell out of his chair at the way she did it. If Mrs. Grump were for sale, I'd sell everything I own to get enough to buy her, for the way she can put into words what she thinks of human beings would make a graven image come to life. She never ...
— Kitty Canary • Kate Langley Bosher
... the delicate sport, approach a net carefully till within an inch of the smile, and then give the old graven image a smart rap on the legs in question to make him leap headlong into the snare—to see that and Josef's black Indian eyes glitter with joy at the chase is amusing. I make him slaughter the game instantly, which ...
— Joy in the Morning • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... not quite the only sort mentioned in the Bible; but the others do not look attractive upon paper. One of them indeed comes more properly under another head, and the rest are all idolatrous; in the service and honour of that biggest idol, the world; whether any special graven image was set up or not. Dances indulged in only by heathen, or by nominal Christians who had swerved from ...
— Tired Church Members • Anne Warner
... wood he lights his fire and cooks his dinner—"He burneth part thereof in the fire; with part thereof he eateth flesh; he roasteth roast and is satisfied; yea, he warmeth himself and saith, Aha, aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire; and the residue thereof he maketh a god, even his graven image; he falleth down unto it and worshippeth it and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me, for thou art ...
— The Preacher and His Models - The Yale Lectures on Preaching 1891 • James Stalker
... himself at a table to one side. He was facing Josie. Mrs. Waller's back was towards him and Captain Waller's profile was in his direct line of vision. Mrs. Waller raised her eyes to her husband's face. No graven image could have been more immovable. Josie gave her attention to Chester Hunt's countenance, determined not to miss his expression when first he became aware of Stephen Waller's presence. She felt reasonably ...
— Mary Louise and Josie O'Gorman • Emma Speed Sampson
... what—something to keep me from coming into that money. I'm afraid a tree will fall on me—I'm afraid a cab will run over me, or a stone drop on me from a housetop, or something. I never was afraid before. I've sat in this park a hundred nights as calm as a graven image without knowing where my breakfast was to come from. But now it's different. I love money, Dawson—I'm happy as a god when it's trickling through my fingers, and people are bowing to me, with the music and the flowers and fine clothes all around. As ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... watching with eyes that glazed from the intensity of his gaze. He saw him sign to his men that he had come upon that which he sought and he saw him pass out of sight toward the north, and still Korak sat like a graven image, with a heart that bled in dumb misery. An hour later Korak moved slowly away, back into the jungle toward the west. He went listlessly, with bent head and stooped shoulders, like an old man who bore upon his back the ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... them dancing is a duty, and a melancholy one. If one danced to celebrate a toothache one might take lessons from them. They stand in the happy circle, their features are composed to an iron gravity, their hands are as rigid as those of a graven image, and then, the fatal moment having arrived, they agitate their legs with a cold fury which is distinctly unpleasant. Having finished they dash their partners from their sides and retire to blush ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens
... beyond it, he begged an ancient worshipper at his side to loan him his triptych. For once, however, the sorrowful figure of the Christ on the central tablet was of no avail, hold it close as he might; strange to say, the face of the graven image assumed her likeness; so he was worse off than before, for now her suffering look was added to ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... to him. One night, some days after her arrival, she developed a skittishness of manner which has since disappeared, and tried to be playful with him; but you might as well try to be playful with a graven image. The wife of one of the servants had just produced a boy, the first after a series of five daughters, and at dinner we drank the health of all parties concerned, the Man of Wrath making the happy father drink a glass off at one ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... grinned broadly, and even Dale winked at the North Star; Medenham had steeled himself against such manifestations of crude opinion—his face was impassive as that of a graven image. ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... am no better than a graven image?" she demanded with a smile. "If that is the best you can do, I may ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... some strange crypt before a basin, shell-shaped and shallow, bearing in its centre a rounded column of less than human height, whose smooth and spherical summit was wreathed with flowers. Lamps similarly formed, and fed with oil of palm, hung above it. There was no other graven image, no visible divinity. Flowers of countless varieties lay heaped upon the pavement; they covered its surface like a carpet, thick, soft; they exhaled their ghosts beneath his feet. The perfume seemed to penetrate his brain,—a perfume sensuous, intoxicating, unholy; ...
— Some Chinese Ghosts • Lafcadio Hearn
... which the imitation is justly pleasant to us: what, in few words,—if we are to be occupied in the making of graven images—we ought to like to make images of. Secondly, after having determined its subject, what degree of imitation or likeness we ought to desire in our graven image; and lastly, under what limitations demanded by structure and material, such likeness ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... Indian, you!" exclaimed Tim, sitting up and dropping his feet to the floor with a crash. "There you stand like a—a graven image, looking as though you'd just received an invitation to a funeral! Cheer, you idiot! Make a noise! Aren't you ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... They were 'any graven image, or the likeness of any thing that is in Heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the waters under the earth.' Not a word touching false gods read ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... wish anything?" she asked without the slightest change of expression. Her voice was colorless, like the speech which might be expected from a graven image. ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... away to more important matters. A council of war was being held beside the wells, and the two Emirs, stern and composed, were listening to a voluble report from the leader of the patrol. The prisoners noticed that, though the fierce, old man stood like a graven image, the younger Emir passed his hand over his beard once or twice with a nervous gesture, the thin, brown fingers twitching ...
— A Desert Drama - Being The Tragedy Of The "Korosko" • A. Conan Doyle
... her to the curved bench on his left; deposits her beside Strephon as if she were his overcoat; and continues without the least change of tone] Shape it as you will, marble remains marble, and the graven image an idol. As I have broken my idols, and cast away my chisel and modelling tools, so will you too break ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw
... under the tablet bearing the quaint inscription picked out in choice Latin, Ferval saw a tall girl. Her bare head would not have marked her in a crowd where motley prevailed; it was her pose that attracted him,—above all, her mediaeval face, with its long, drooping nose which recalled some graven image of Jean Goujon. Her skin was tanned; her hair, flame-coloured, was confined by a classic fillet; her eyes, Oriental in fulness, were light blue—Ferval had crossed to the apparition and noted these things. She did not return his stare, but continued to gaze at the archway as ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... is surely something modest and manly about not attempting to express our greatest poet in the plastic arts in which we do not excel. We honour Shakspere as the Jews honour God—by not daring to make of him a graven image. Our sculpture, our statues, are good enough for bankers and philanthropists, who are our curse: not good enough for him, who is our benediction. Why should we celebrate the very art in which we triumph by the very art ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... "It's the graven image," explained the captain. "She's been on a cruise down town somewheres. Be a lot of sore throats in that direction ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... not,' I say 'I will,' but it is God who decides." With a little sobbing sigh she relinquished the unequal struggle, just as Hobson walked boldly into the room and stood inside the door, like a graven image of intense displeasure, when her mistress, unable to withstand the unspoken disapproval, consented, after a promise to Jill to have another long talk on the ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... They couldn't understand, after the experience of a million years, that the only things that really counted in life were human relations. They were obliged to go on playing a game of bluff with their consecrated superstitions—playing—playing—playing—and yet hiding behind some graven image of authority which they had built out of stone. Sentimental, yes, and pathetic too, when one thought of ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... "So there's Harry Lauder coming, is there? And he's the funniest wee man in the halls, is he? He'd make a graven image laugh, would he? Well, I'll be seeing! Maybe he can make me laugh— maybe no. We'll just ...
— Between You and Me • Sir Harry Lauder
... was playing with it as a toy. They told me, as news, "This came from the country of the Christians; it ought not to have been made, it is haram." All toys of men and animals are considered by these rigid Moslems as so many violations of the commandment "Thou shalt not make unto thyself any graven image." ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... of the Divine Agony. Before this holy symbol Helen stood in earnest reverence. She did not kneel (for the forms of the religion in which she had been reared were opposed to that posture of worship before the graven image), but you could see in that countenance, eloquent at once with the enthusiasm and the meekness of piety, that the soul was filled with the memories and the hopes which, age after age, have consoled the sufferer and inspired the martyr. The soul ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... a graven image, the stock of his little 22 caliber high power Savage nestling against his cheek. Our eyes met for an instant and I knew in that glance that the blue tiger would never make another charge, for if I missed him, Harry wouldn't. For ten minutes ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... her," said Donald. "Why, man, the spectacle must have been enough to make a graven image chuckle. Didn't Madam ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... Seventh-day Adventist dare exhibit the full copy before his audience, unless he does it at the peril of his teaching. Here it is: "I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other Gods before me. Thou shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in earth beneath, or that is in the waters beneath the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities ...
— The Christian Foundation, May, 1880
... Mrs. Daggett with spirit. "It don't help him none to stop walking altogether and stand stock still in the middle of the road, like he was a graven image. I'll take the whip to him, ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley
... God, which liberated thee from the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. Ye shall have no other gods. Ye shall not make to yourselves any graven image, nor any likeness that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters under the earth. Ye shall not bow down to them nor serve them. I am God, your God. Sanctify ... in six days ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 401, September 8, 1883 • Various
... I deserved my punishment, for no Aztec ever worshipped his stone God more devoutly than I did my black-eyed, smooth-lipped idol. 'Thou shalt have no other gods before me.' Ah! my 'graven image' seemed so marvellously godlike that I bowed down before it; and there, in the midst of my adoration, the curse of idolatry smote me. Half bewildered by the rapture that made my heart throb almost ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... him like a graven image, but vouchsafed no reply. Stane lay there wondering if it had anything to do with Miskodeed, and finally, recalling the girl's dramatic appearance at the very moment when he had been stricken down, ...
— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns
... repressed. It is only when we think of the bulls and the hawks, of the deified cats and sacred ichneumons of Egypt, that we realize the full meaning of the command—"Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image!" ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... jimcrow ground-owls you-all sees inhabitin' about dissoloote an' permiscus with prairie-dogs. What's the result? Dave's sperits begins to sink; he takes to droopin' about listless an' onregyardful; an' he's that low an' onhappy his nosepaint don't bring him no more of comfort than if he's a graven image. Why, it's the saddest thing I ...
— Wolfville Nights • Alfred Lewis
... say so!' exclaimed the skipper, who thought that the aforesaid graven image on the cut-water of his old ship, far excelled the Venus de Medici in beauty of feature and form. 'She must be almighty beautiful; and then, my son, she is as rich as the Rajah of Rangoon, who owns a diamond as big as our viol-block. Did you fall ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... there a tribe on the earth that did not have substantially, those commandments. What, then, were new? First, "Thou shalt worship no other God; thou shalt have no other God." Why? "Because I am a jealous God." Second, "Thou shalt not make any graven image." Third, "Thou shalt not take My name in vain." Fourth, "Thou shalt not work on the Sabbath day." What use were these commandments? None—not the slightest. How much better it would have been if God from Sinai, instead of the commandments, ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... said, "and God does not; and people who talk as if He did not want us to seek happiness—even our own happiness—are making to themselves a graven image. I will tell you how I think about it, because I have been alone a great deal and been always very much afraid, and that has made me think a great deal, and you have been very kind, for you risked your life for my poor people, and now you would risk something more than that to help me. Will ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... the tears came into his eyes. It's my belief that that blessed man worships the ground she treads on. I don't mean worships, either,—'cause that would be wicked, and he's too good a man to make a graven image of anything,—but it's clear to see that there a'n't anybody in the world like Mary to him. I always did think so; but I used to think Mary was such a little poppet—that she'd do better for—Well, you know, I thought about some younger man;—but, laws, now ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... future. My own judgment is that for the Democrats, McDonald is as strong a man as they can get. He is a man of most excellent sense and would be regarded as a safe man. Tilden? He is dead, and he occupies no stronger place in the general heart than a graven image. With no magnetism, he has nothing save his smartness ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll
... chief and his staring companions withdrew, devoutly prostrating themselves not to the graven image, but to the living, breathing beings who were awaiting, with an ungodlike appetite, an opportunity to make way with ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... permitted to languish. The number of Netherlanders who were burned, strangled, beheaded, or buried alive, in obedience to his edicts, and for the offences of reading the Scriptures, of looking askance at a graven image, or of ridiculing the actual presence of the body and blood of Christ in a wafer, have been placed as high as one hundred thousand by distinguished authorities, and have never been put at a lower mark ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... it was found that the interiors of no less than thirty churches inside the walls had been utterly destroyed. Not a graven image, scarcely a picture, remained in any ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... since the ninety-eight men—ninety-nine, counting Henry Woods—had stepped into the brittle column of light to be shunted back through unguessed time to a different plane of existence. The old scientist, during all those hours, had stood like a graven image before his machine, eyes ...
— Hellhounds of the Cosmos • Clifford Donald Simak
... has often turned these from their true and original design. The very wood on the surface of the earth he has cut down, and the very stone and metal in its bowels he has hewn and cast, and converted into a graven image, and worshipped in the place of his beneficent Creator. The food, which has been given him for his nourishment, he has frequently converted by his intemperance into the means of injuring his health. The wine that was designed to make his heart glad on reasonable and necessary occasions, ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume I (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson
... horsewhip—then flying at the priests, he gave them a sound flogging, kicked them down the private stair, and spurned the man, box and image after them—then locking the door, he gave his sisters a fine sermon, in which he represented to them their folly in worshipping a silly wooden graven image, which, though it had eyes, could see not; though it had ears, could hear not; though it had hands, could not help itself; and though it had feet, could not move about unless it were carried. Oh, it was ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... thought to the religion of his times. Every day he went into the temple to bow down in devout worship of the heathen gods, to take part in the rites and ceremonies of his faith, and even to offer sacrifice to Thor and Odin. The graven image of Odin was to him, as to most of the Norsemen, a sacred and a holy thing. When he took oath it was by the sign of Thor's hammer that he swore; he knew the names and the special powers of all the gods in Asgard, and Valhalla ...
— Olaf the Glorious - A Story of the Viking Age • Robert Leighton
... said Carew, laughing, "it is a part—and a part of a very good whole, too—a comedy by young Tom Heywood, that would make a graven image split its sides with laughing; and do thou just learn that part, good Master Skylark, and thou shalt ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... Miss," he announced, bowing deeply. "If you desire to freshen yourself a bit after your profound slumbers, you will find here some of the finest water in the universe and a towel warranted to produce a blush upon the cheek of a graven image." ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... was there, as ever the most simply attired personage in the Union. His beautiful wife, however, beaming and gracious, but no less rigid than "Lady Washington," in her social statutes, looked like a bird of paradise beside a graven image, so gorgeous was her raiment. Baron Steuben was in the regalia of war and a breastplate of orders. Kitty Livingston, now Mrs. Matthew Ridley, had also received a fine new gown of Mrs. Church's selection, for the two women still were friends, despite ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... hated to pay, especially without a long bargaining, but he knew his friend well enough to realize that it was a waste of valuable time, and that one might just as well try to bargain with a graven image. Slowly he drew out a leather pouch from his capacious pants' pocket and opening it placed—How many twenty dollar gold pieces, Reader, to make five hundred dollars? Well, Tom, what is it? "Fifteen." You Johnny? "Twenty-five." ...
— Frontier Boys in Frisco • Wyn Roosevelt
... get anything themselves: and then very often Rushton himself would come and stalk quietly about the house or stand silently behind the men, watching them as they worked. He seldom spoke to anyone, but just stood there like a graven image, or walked about like a dumb animal—a pig, as the men used to say. This individual had a very exalted idea of his own importance and dignity. One man got the sack for presuming to stop him in the street to ask some questions about some ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... this hope in the case of the photograph: that its amorous possessor will probably be incapable of imagining any one insensitive to such a Golconda of charms, and you have always in your power the revenge of showing him your own sacred graven image. ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne
... time was eight, and three days seemed to her a generous time limit. But Nathaniel's stony heart did not melt, and at the end of the three days Priscilla ceased to pray for many and many a year, and forthwith she proceeded to worship a graven image of her own creation. ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... friend, I'm not accustomed to sit still like a graven image and be mystified in my own house. Will you have the ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... her hand, and she sat like a small graven image. To see those words so cruelly set in black and white, staring at her with frightful truth, harrowed the very soul of her. A sobbing outburst from Bobbie mingled with the soft chug, chug of the engine outside on the track. Happy Pete, too, felt the tragedy in the air. He wriggled nearer his ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... innocence is? Ask the average clergyman to describe innocence to you, and when he gets through, think a bit, take off the tinsel words with which he has decked out his graven image, and you'll find what? Ignorance enshrined. Every clergy the world has seen has enshrined ignorance, and ignorance has no single virtue that a sound ...
— Through stained glass • George Agnew Chamberlain |
