"Pelf" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... all to himself, Just like a miser counting o'er his pelf? I do believe he's talking in blank verse, Or reasoning in rhyme, which would be worse. He's deaf; if he were blind, 't would suit us better, For then he couldn't read ...
— Turandot: The Chinese Sphinx • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... Britain, in the zenith of her power and greatness, think kindly of the native races, and now for once in her history rule this great island for right and righteousness, in justice and mercy, and not for self and pelf in unrighteousness, blood, and falsehood. It is to be hoped that future generations of New Guinea natives will not rise up to condemn her, as the New Zealanders have done, and to claim their ancient rights with ...
— Adventures in New Guinea • James Chalmers
... those wretched small stones, and wear them night and day in a belt round his waist, as if he really loved them for their own mere sakes—dirty high-priced little baubles! Granville, for his part, couldn't bear to see such ingrained love of pelf. It was miserable; it ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... snares, Self-seeking men, by ignorance deluded, Strive by unrighteous means to pile up riches. Then, in their self-complacency, they say, "This acquisition I have made to-day, That will I gain to-morrow, so much pelf Is hoarded up already, so much more Remains that I have yet to treasure up. This enemy I have destroyed, him also, And others in their turn, I will despatch. I am a lord; I will enjoy myself; I'm wealthy, ...
— Book of Wise Sayings - Selected Largely from Eastern Sources • W. A. Clouston
... lady? I've not learn'd to woo: Thou art on the shady Side of sixty too. Still I love thee dearly! Thou hast lands and pelf: But I love ...
— Fly Leaves • C. S. Calverley
... flow; He pours no cordial in the wounds of pain; Unlocks no prison, and unclasps no chain; His heart is like the rock where sun nor dew Can rear one plant or flower of heavenly hue. No thought of mercy there may have its birth, For helpless misery or suffering worth; The end of all his life is paltry pelf, And all his thoughts are centred on—himself: The wretch of both worlds; for so mean a sum, First starved in this, then damn'd in ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... the good old fellow! He hates to hoard his pelf; He wishes to make all people As ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... battle or business, whatever the game, In law, or in love it is ever the same: In the struggle for power, or the scramble for pelf, Let this be your motto, "Rely on yourself."—J. ...
— The True Citizen, How To Become One • W. F. Markwick, D. D. and W. A. Smith, A. B.
... matches for herself, And daughters, brothers, sisters, kith or kin, Arranging them like books on the same shelf, There's nothing women love to dabble in More (like a stock-holder in growing pelf) Than match-making in general: 't is no sin Certes, but a preventative, and therefore That is, no doubt, the ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... such a rate, He soon arrives at Harley's gate; But was so dirty, pale, and thin, Old Read[10] would hardly let him in. Said Harley, "Welcome, rev'rend dean! What makes your worship look so lean? Why, sure you won't appear in town In that old wig and rusty gown? I doubt your heart is set on pelf So much that you neglect yourself. What! I suppose, now stocks are high, You've some good purchase in your eye? Or is your money out at use?"— "Truce, good my lord, I beg a truce!" The doctor in a passion cry'd, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... a case without a Judge, It's clear your case will never budge; But if a Judge you have to face, The chances are you'll lose your case. To win your case, and save your pelf, Why, try the blooming ...
— The Magic Pudding • Norman Lindsay
... landlord to Thomas, "Your rent I must raise, I'm so plaguily pinch'd for the pelf." "Raise my rent!" replies Thomas; "your honor's main good; For I never can raise ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... she said, "To keep his paltry pelf; The knight who would my castle win, Must dare to come himself." And forth she sternly bade him go, But followed with her eyes. I ween she knew the brave knight well Through all ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... the dice, Make me rich in a trice, Oh give me the prize! Alas, for myself! Had I plenty of pelf, I then should ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... hermit Japan, as we see him in the literature of men who were hostile in faith and covetous rivals in trade, is a repulsive figure. He seems to be a brutal wretch, seeking only gain, and willing to sell conscience, humanity and his religion, for pelf. In reality, he was an ordinary European, probably no better, certainly no worse, than his age or the average man of his country or of his continent. Further, among this average dozen of exiles in the interest of commerce, science or culture, ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... force she now defies; Venus her smiles wherewith she Mars did meet; Python a voice, Diana made her chaste, Ceres gave plenty, Cupid lent his bow, Thetis his feet, there Pallas wisdom placed. With these she queen-like kept a world in awe. Yet all these honors deemed are but pelf, For she is much more ...
— Elizabethan Sonnet Cycles - Phillis - Licia • Thomas Lodge and Giles Fletcher
... turned From wandering on a foreign strand? If such there breathe, go, mark him well; For him no minstrel raptures swell; High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim; Despite those titles, power, and pelf, The wretch concentered all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... on either earth or pelf, But upon wisdom, and on love and virtue; 'Twixt Feltro and Feltro shall ...
— Divine Comedy, Longfellow's Translation, Hell • Dante Alighieri
... wise, I might seem to advise So great a potentate as yourself; They should, sir, I tell ye, spare't out of their belly, And this way spend some of their pelf. ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow, Vol. IV (of IV) • Harrison S. Morris
... Devil's corpse was leaded down; His decent heirs enjoyed his pelf, Mourning-coaches, many a one, 680 Followed his hearse along the town:— ...
— Peter Bell the Third • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... fear no pelf or harm, By red Priapus sentinelled; By his huge sickle's formidable charm The ...
— The Elegies of Tibullus • Tibullus
... man is strange and deep, Deceiving others and himself; Its wiles would make an angel weep, In strife for praise, for power and pelf. ...
— Canada and Other Poems • T.F. Young
... guarded you always, Willie, Body and soul from harm; I'll guard your faith and honor, Your innocence and charm From the polls and their evil spirits, Politics, rum and pelf; Do you think I'd send my only son Where I ...
— Are Women People? • Alice Duer Miller
... do discomfort those who think more of pelf than of courage and of virtue; those who, as that Hebrew prophet wrote, lay field to field and house to house, until the wretched whom they have robbed find no place left whereon to dwell? What if I proved your sagest chapmen fools, and gorge your ...
— Ayesha - The Further History of She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed • H. Rider Haggard
... [21]Greedy that you are of gain, every man's hand lusting for his neighbour's pelf, every heart set on pillage and rapine;[21] who, of ye all, if the crown were set on his head, would give an empire up for the mob to scramble for? The people are not yet fit ...
— Vera - or, The Nihilists • Oscar Wilde
... must to my grave that dischargeth all cares, and leave you to the world that increaseth many sorrows: my silver hairs containeth great experience, and in the number of my years are penned down the subtleties of fortune. Therefore, as I leave you some fading pelf to countercheck poverty, so I will bequeath you infallible precepts that shall lead you unto virtue. First, therefore, unto thee Saladyne, the eldest, and therefore the chiefest pillar of my house, wherein should be engraven as well the excellence ...
— Rosalynde - or, Euphues' Golden Legacy • Thomas Lodge
... that should be, in the case of a first-rate military hero and commander—Scipio notwithstanding. It brightens his flame, and it is agreeable to them. That is how they come to distinction: they have no other chance; they are only women; they are mad to be singed, and they rush pelf-mall, all for the honour ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... is fixed On one point and made up: To accept my lot unmixed; Never to drug the cup But drink it by myself. I'll not be wooed for pelf; I'll not blot out my shame With any man's good name; But nameless as I stand, My hand is my own hand, And nameless as I came I go to ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti
... indiscriminate worshippers of money; they were not trained in the school of good morals; and when people, brought up without the pale of the precepts of probity, are congenitally cursed with a greed for pelf and a legion of evil and rascally proclivities, they become easily pervious to the promptings of all ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross
... kiddie Of the group with their stars in the Flag, And it's looked on Outside as an alien, Where its treatment makes honest men gag. It's treated the same as the harlot Who barters her body for pelf And carries it home to her master And is told to look ...
— Rhymes of a Roughneck • Pat O'Cotter
... I sonnet-sing you about myself? Do I live in a house you would like to see? Is it scant of gear, has it store of pelf? 'Unlock my heart ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... (2000 dollars) to unite him with them, and that he had thought of giving Asaad the same sum, that no obstacle might remain to his leaving them. "This money," said he, "with which the English print books, and hire men into their service is but the pelf of the man of sin, and could you but be present to hear what the people say of you, through the whole country, for your associating with the English, you would never be in their ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... his worth must understand; Whoe'er doesn't nobly drive the trade, 'Twere best from the business far he'd stayed. If I cheerily set my life on a throw, Something still better than life I'll know; Or I'll stand to be slain for the paltry pelf, As the Croat still ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... regretted, But yet in public never fretted. When he his compliments had paid To royalty, thus newly made, "Great sire, I know a place," said he, "Where lies conceal'd a treasure, Which, by the right of royalty, Should bide your royal pleasure." The King lack'd not an appetite For such financial pelf, And, not to lose his royal right, Ran straight to see it for himself. It was a trap, and he was caught. Said Reynard, "Would you have it thought, You Ape, that you can fill a throne, And guard the rights of all, alone. Not knowing how to guard ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... populous, smooth-paved, and gay. The flesh it was strong, but the spirit was faint. He first was too young, then too old, for a saint. He wished well by his neighbors, did well by himself, And hoped for salvation, and struggled for pelf; And easy Tomorrow still promised to pay The still swelling debts of his bankrupt Today, Till, bestriding the deep sudden chasm that is fixed The sunshiny world and the shadowy betwixt, His Today with a pale wond'ring face stood alone, And ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... ask thee for no meaner pelf Than that I may not disappoint myself; That in my striving I may soar as high As I can now discern with this clear eye. That my weak hand may equal my firm faith, And my life practise more than my ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... with his Ledger, Blends Gospel texts with trading gammon, A black-leg saint, a spiritual hedger, Who backs his rigid Sabbath, so to speak, Against the wicked remnant of the week, A saving bet against his sinful bias— "Rogue that I am," he whispers to himself, "I lie—I cheat—do anything for pelf, But who on earth can say I am ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... should have not to distrain From several that vast beauty ne'er yet shown, To one exalted dame alone The total sum was lent in her pure self:— Heaven had made sorry gain, Recovering from the crowd its scattered pelf. Now in a puff of breath, Nay, in one second, God Hath ta'en her back through death, Back from the senseless folk and from our eyes. Yet earth's oblivious sod, Albeit her body dies, Will bury not her live words fair and holy. Ah, cruel mercy! Here thou showest ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... a dreffle smart man: He's ben on all sides that give place or pelf; But consistency still wuz a part of his plan,— He's ben true to one party,—an' thet is himself:— So John P. Robinson, he Sez he ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 23, October, 1891 • Various
... Wylie's design of walking in and chucking the two thousand pounds into Nancy's lap. On the contrary, he shoved them deeper down in his pocket, and resolved to see the old gentleman to bed, and then produce his pelf, and ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... favourite courtier of his day. And how should it be otherwise, when from the lips whence other lessons should have proceeded, selfishness has been inculcated as a duty, a desire for vain distinctions and the love of pelf encouraged as virtues, and a splendid equipage, or it may be some bodily advantage, pointed out as the highest object of human ambition? To set the just value on every enjoyment, to choose noble and becoming objects of pursuit, are ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... its spirit braves, O'er mountain-crags and ocean-waves, Then make ourselves the worst of slaves, A slave to self, To satisfy the thirst that craves For yellow pelf. ...
— The Black-Sealed Letter - Or, The Misfortunes of a Canadian Cockney. • Andrew Learmont Spedon
... heard us talk about his lineage, deplore the length of his nose, or call him "clever-looking." We should have been ashamed to let him smell about us the tar-brush of a sense of property, to let him think we looked on him as an asset to earn us pelf or glory. We wished that there should be between us the spirit that was between the sheep dog and that farmer, who, when asked his dog's age, touched the old creature's head, and answered thus: "Teresa" (his daughter) "was born in November, and this one in August." That sheep dog had seen eighteen ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... met one who was not intent on truckling for place and pelf. His ideals were as high and excellent as her own—his mind more sincere. Life was more to him than to her, because he was working his energies up into art, and she was only allowing ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 4 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Painters • Elbert Hubbard
... the lad was frank and free; Of late he's grown brimful of pride and pelf; You wonder that he don't remember me? Why, don't you ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston
... Who, born to guide such high emprize, For Britain's weal was early wise; Alas! to whom the Almighty gave, For Britain's sins, an early grave! His worth, who, in his mightiest hour, A bauble held the pride of power, Spurned at the sordid lust of pelf, And served his Albion for herself; Who, when the frantic crowd amain Strained at subjection's bursting rein, O'er their wild mood full conquest gained, The pride he would not crush restrained, Showed their fierce zeal a worthier cause, And brought the freeman's ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott
... I said to myself, Choose a career and start after the pelf, Early to bed and early to rise, You're sure to get wealthy and awfully wise, So I started out to look around, But nice fat jobs weren't ...
— Rhymes of the Rookies • W. E. Christian
... race put her owner right clear of his debts, He landed a fortune in stakes and in bets, He paid the old bailiff the whole of his pelf, And gave him a hiding to keep ...
— Saltbush Bill, J.P., and Other Verses • A. B. Paterson
... ground, it seemed as he gathered the rest of his strength Into the utterance—"Pan spoke thus: 'For what thou hast done Count on a worthy reward! Henceforth be allowed thee release From the racer's toil, no vulgar reward in praise or in pelf!' ...
— Graded Poetry: Seventh Year - Edited by Katherine D. Blake and Georgia Alexander • Various
... Betrayers, doubters and those who deny with an oath are always recruited from the ranks of the followers. In a sermon John Wesley once said: "To adopt and live a life of simplicity and service for mankind is difficult; but to follow the love of luxury, making a clutch for place, pelf and power, labeling Paganism Christianity, and imagining you are a follower of Christ, this is easy. Yet all through life we see that the reward is paid for the difficult task. And now I summon you to a life of difficulty, not merely for the sake of the reward, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... given up to the chase (for pelts or pelf) and careful of his status in the tribe, thinks only of himself ...
— Hints for Lovers • Arnold Haultain
... anxious that the other should have the best of it. Yet, instead of that being the case, the mischief, the myriad mischief, of money set in, until I heartily wished sometimes that my miserable self was down in the hole which the pelf had left behind it. ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... longer hail thee { King and Lord { Lord and King I have redeemed myself with all I had, And now possess my fortunes poor but glad. With all I had I have redeemed myself, And escaped at once from slavery and pelf. The unruly wishes must a ruler take, Our high desires do our low fortunes make: Those only who desire palatial things Do bear the fetters and the frowns of Kings; Set free thy slave; thou settest ...
— New Poems • Robert Louis Stevenson
... in conclusion, why I do not seek myself All the laurel and the glory of these seeds I sell for pelf. I will tell you, though the confidence I can't deny is rash, I'm a trifle long on laurels, and ...
— Cobwebs from a Library Corner • John Kendrick Bangs
... miser on a heap of rust Sat pining all his life there, did scarce trust His own hands with the dust, Yet would not place one piece above, but lives In fear of thieves. Thousands there were as frantic as himself, And hugged each one his pelf; The downright epicure placed heaven in sense, And scorned pretence; While others, slipped into a wide excess, Said little less; The weaker sort slight, trivial wares enslave, Who think them brave, And poor, despised truth sat counting ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... begg'd for my master, And got him store of pelf, But goodness now be praised, I'm begging for myself. And a-begging we will go, Will go, will go, And a-begging we ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... saved from a long civil war. Louis XIII. (1610-1643) was a child; and the queen, Mary de Medici, who was the regent, an Italian woman, with no earnest principles, deprived of the counsels of Sully, lavished the resources of the crown upon nobles, who were greedy of place and pelf. At the assembly of the States-general in 1614, nobles, clergy, and the third estate were loud in reciprocal accusations. The queen fell under the influence of the Concinis, an Italian waiting-maid and her husband, the latter of whom she ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... thee, gallant, betwixt wealth and honour; There lies the pelf, in sum to bear thee through The dance of youth, and the turmoil of manhood, Yet leave enough for age's chimney-corner; But an thou grasp to it, farewell ambition, Farewell each hope of bettering thy condition, And raising ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... my Father, a Maunder my Mother, [1] A Filer my Sister, a Filcher my Brother, A Canter my Uncle, that car'd not for Pelf, A Lifter my Aunt, and a Beggar myself; In white wheaten Straw, when their Bellies were full, Then was I got between a Tinker and a Trull. And therefore a Beggar, a Beggar I'll be, For there's none lives a Life more jocund ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... heights before untrod, Light, darkness, air and water, heat and cold He bids go forth and bring him power and pelf. And yet though ruler, king and demi-god He walks with his fierce passions uncontrolled The conquerer of all ...
— Custer, and Other Poems. • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... present in the most poetic light the rampant, untamable individualism of the ancient Germanic paganism. In defiance of his friend Bjoern's advice, Frithjof, weary of this bootless chase for glory and pelf, resolves to see Ingeborg once more before he dies, and, disguised as a salt-boiler, he enters King Ring's hall. There he sees his beloved sitting in the high-seat beside her aged lord; and the sorrow which ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... him, and his friend forsook. Bad luck go with the fellow, who unjustly some restores From exile, while some others he had banished from our shores, And some he puts to death; and sits among us gorged with pelf. He kept an ample table at the Isthmian games himself, And gave to every guest that came full plenty of cold meat, The which they with a prayer did each and every of them eat, But their prayer was 'Next year be there ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... they'll whine how I met the great Bertrand himself, The miracle-worker and saint. But those women will tell any "walkers" for pelf, And swear I'm all ...
— Twixt France and Spain • E. Ernest Bilbrough
... talking about what concerneth thee not: indeed thou hast straitened my breast and distracted my mind." Quoth he, "Meseems thou art a hasty man;" and quoth I, "Yes ! yes! yes!" and he, "I rede thee practice restraint of self, for haste is Satan's pelf which bequeatheth only repentance and ban and bane, and He (upon whom be blessings and peace!) hath said, 'The best of works is that wherein deliberation lurks;' but I, by Allah! have some doubt about thine affair; and so I should like thee to let me know what it is thou art in such haste to ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... we grow more wise When Radcliffe's page we cease to prize, And turn to Malthus, and to Hervey, For tombs, or cradles topsy-turvy; 'Tis sweet to flatter one's dear self, And altered feelings vaunt, when pelf Is passion, poetry, romance; — And all our faith's in three per cents." R. ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor
... should prefer his scandalous pelf, the dust and dregs of the earth, to the prosperity and grandeur of ...
— The History of John Bull • John Arbuthnot
... so by this means, as they save their pigs, which they would not lose, (I mean their worldly pelf), so they would please the Protestants, and be counted with them for gospellers, yea, marry, would they."—Writings of ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 56, November 23, 1850 • Various
... strife and the greed are forgot And the struggle for pelf, A man can get rid of each taint and each spot And clean up himself; He can be what he wanted to be when a boy, If only in dreams; And revel once more in the depths of a joy That's as real ...
— A Heap o' Livin' • Edgar A. Guest
... to Clarabella, And quickly homewards bent my way, And there became a rustic fellow, And donned a suit of hodden-grey. And then I hired me to a farmer, Concealing every sign of pelf, One Hodge, who had a pretty charmer, Who might love me ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume XXIV. • Revised by Alexander Leighton
... it is slander to say you oppressed them; Does a man squander the price of his pelf? Was it not often that he who possessed them Rather was owned by his servants himself? Caring for all, as in health so in sicknesses, He was their father, their patriarch chief; Age's infirmities, infancy's weaknesses Leaning on ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... the least of it, was a very prickly thorn in the side of the police. My excuse is that Jack Sincler and his brother Lishe were kindly men withal. The game-laws were their trouble, but as far as I could make out they did not poach for the sake of pelf but from sheer love of sport. Among poachers they ought, anyhow, to be placed in Class I., for they loved the open air and the freshness of the morning and all the things that make for a clean mind in a clean body. Jack, though a shade arrogant at times, is a stimulating figure, ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 7, 1914 • Various
... clasp, For I love the hand of honest toil, its firm and heartfelt grasp; And I know, O miners brave and true, that not alone for self Have ye heaped, through many wearying months, your glittering pile of pelf. ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... rather than anger. Many readers will have heard of the practice of "gouging," with which, according to the veracious English traveler of early days, the native American gave the charm of diversity and diversion to a life whose serious thoughts were wholly absorbed in the acquisition of pelf. Some will remember the definition given of it in Grose's "Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue:" "to squeeze out a man's eye with the thumb; a cruel practice used by the Bostonians in America." A curious illustration of the belief in this myth occurred to Cooper. ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury
... we traitorously gave the best friend that we had For spiritless pelf—as we felt ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... Where I'm much too well known to be trusted, And plaguily pestered for tin; Where love has two eyes for your banker, And one chilly glance for yourself; Where souls can afford to be franker, But when they're well garnished with pelf. ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... Nelson's: but, he is rich in great and noble deeds; which t'other, poor devil! is not. So, let dirty wretches get pelf, to comfort them; victory belongs to Nelson. Not, but what I think money necessary for comforts; and, I hope, our, your's, and my Nelson, will get a little, for ...
— The Letters of Lord Nelson to Lady Hamilton, Vol II. - With A Supplement Of Interesting Letters By Distinguished Characters • Horatio Nelson
... do you think was his answer? In a voice that made me tremble, he said, disdainfully, "You oblige ME, sir!—and pray sir, who are you that presume to offer to oblige me?—call tomorrow, sir, on my treasurer, and the pelf shall be paid to you, sir." And as I went down stairs I could hear him say to himself several times, "Oblige ME indeed, ha, ha, hah!—you oblige ME!!" In a word I got the money from him, but never saw him after." "You saw ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 4, April 1810 • Various
... esplori, sercxi. Peerage nobelaro. Peerless senegala, nekomparebla. Peevish malafabla, cxagrena. Peevishness malafableco. Peg (a hook) krocxilo, lignanajlo. Peg sxtopileto. Pelerine manteleto. Pelf mono. Pelican pelikano. Pelisse pelto. Pellet kugleto, buleto. Pellicle membraneto. Pell-mell intermiksita, e. Pellucid diafana. Pelt felo. Pen plumo. Pen (to enclose) barcxirkauxi, enfermi. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... deathless lyres the strains prolong, That gush from living founts of song, Without a cross; Here spirits never feel the weight Of Wrong, or Envy, or of Hate, Or earthly loss; The pomp of Pelf—the pride of Birth— The gilded trappings of this earth ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... money, Mr. Meiklewham?" said her ladyship.—"That wretched old pettifogger," she added in a whisper to Tyrrel, "thinks of nothing else but the filthy pelf." ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... Guy was silent as a miser hoarding pelf. He knew 'twas time to put his grouch away upon the shelf. And so he did.—You see, I was ...
— It Can Be Done - Poems of Inspiration • Joseph Morris
... burned, As home his footsteps he hath turned, From wandering on a foreign strand! If such there breathe, go, mark him well; For him no Minstrel raptures swell; High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim; Despite those titles, power, and pelf, The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... such advice, I know, is much approved, Yet not thus can Severus' soul be moved. To Fate unequal—equal to myself— In duty's path I go. For power and pelf I never swerve where honour leads the way; Come weal, come woe, her call I must obey. Let fate depress an all unequal scale, Let Clothe hold her distaff—I'll not fail! Yet one more word—this to thy private ...
— Polyuecte • Pierre Corneille
... was ever truly great Who sought to serve himself alone, Who put himself above the state, Above the friends about him thrown. No man was ever truly glad Who risked his joy on hoarded pelf, And gave of nothing that he had Through fear ...
— Over Here • Edgar A. Guest
... care would line my marble brow; I'd take no thought of pelf; I'd lie the long day through at ease a-thinking of myself; For when a man's mere presence lends to any scene delight He needn't worry what he does—whate'er he ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various
... can't be too deliberate,' Said Paul, 'in parting with one's pelf. With bills, as you correctly state, I'm punctuality itself: A man may surely claim his dues: But, when there's money to be lent, A man must be allowed to choose Such ...
— Sylvie and Bruno • Lewis Carroll
... or church steeple. The man in question has forgotten to cut off evidence, and, in order to work out a theory, has killed two persons. He has committed a murder, and yet has not known how to take possession of the pelf; what he has taken he has hidden under a stone. The anguish he experienced while hearing knocking at the door and the continued ringing of the bell, was not enough for him: no, yielding to an irresistible desire of experiencing the same horror, he has positively revisited ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... magnificent scramble for place, pelf and power! It were blasphemy to call this riot the desire for progress for the masses. It were equal blasphemy to call it stupidity and reaction, on the part of the contending monarchs, as against crushing with iron heel the hopes ...
— Blood and Iron - Origin of German Empire As Revealed by Character of Its - Founder, Bismarck • John Hubert Greusel
... And left Hallelujah broke off in the middle: Jove's Court, and the Presence angelical, cut— To eke out the work of a lazy young slut. Angel-duck, Angel-duck, winged and silly, Pouring a watering-pot over a lily, Gardener gratuitous, careless of pelf, Leave her to water her lily herself, Or to neglect it to death if she chuse it: Remember the loss is her own if she ...
— A Nonsense Anthology • Collected by Carolyn Wells
... The marmots are off to their underground dens, And the wishtonwish marmot, the kind prairie dog, Makes room in his hole for the tortoise and frog. The hamster runs home, with the pouch in his cheek Stuff'd with various provisions enough for a week; Then stores in his dark lonely cell the rich pelf, For, ill bred and greedy, he cares but for self. No children, no wife, no companion had he, With his very best friend he could never agree, But lived by himself without pleasure or mirth, In a hermit-like vault, five feet deep in the earth; But the sentinel marmot's shrill whistle ...
— The Quadrupeds' Pic-Nic • F. B. C.
... to choose his task, goes down into the market-place to sell his force, and here he fights with new weapons a harder fight; while his Woman waits behind the firing line to care for him,—to equip him and to hoard his pelf. On the strength and wisdom of her commissariatship the fate of this battle in good part depends. Of such a nature was Colonel Price's marriage. "He made the money, I saved it," Harmony Price proudly repeated in the after-time. "We lived our lives together, your mother and I," her husband said ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... not for me to note with facile pen Successive stages of the L. of N. With calorimetric and statistic arts Administer the prog of Foreign Parts, Or, eager not to do the thing by halves, To reconcile the Czechs and Jugo-Slavs— I will, resigning honours, kudos, pelf, Administer hot cocoa to myself; Then to repose; for it is truly said The best location ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Feb. 12, 1919 • Various
... cries for workers; not toilers for pelf, But souls who have sought to eliminate self. Can the lame lead the race? Can the blind guide the blind? We must better ourselves ere we ...
— Three Women • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... a dreffle smart man: He's ben on all sides thet give places or pelf; But consistency still wuz a part of his plan— He's been true to one party—an' thet is himself; So John P. Robinson he Sez he shall vote ...
— Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, • Sherwin Cody
... thy barn and storehouse treasure Did He take thy hoarded pelf? Yes: to feed thee was His pleasure, Like the ...
— A Brief Memoir with Portions of the Diary, Letters, and Other Remains, - of Eliza Southall, Late of Birmingham, England • Eliza Southall
... doomstroke, and to Dis the bleak Must pass great Hector's slayer. Zeus on high, Hidden from men, held up the scales; the sky Told Thetis that her son must go the way He sent Queen Hecuba's—himself must pay, Himself though young, splendid Achilles' self, The price of manslaying, with blood for pelf. A grief immortal took her, and she grieved Deep in sea-cave, whereover restless heaved The wine-dark ocean—silently, not moving, Tearless, a god. O Gods, however loving, That is a lonely grief that must go dry About the graves where ...
— Helen Redeemed and Other Poems • Maurice Hewlett
... thereby win forgetfulness And pardon of the spirit's excess, Which soar'd too nigh that jealous Heaven Ever, save thus, to be forgiven. No Gospel has come down that cures With better gain a loss like yours. Be pious! Give the beggar pelf, And love your neighbour as yourself! You, who yet love, though all is o'er, And she'll ne'er be your neighbour more, With soul which can in pity smile That aught with such a measure vile As self should be at all named "love!" Your sanctity the ...
— The Victories of Love - and Other Poems • Coventry Patmore
... souls and forgiving sins. THUS will human laws kill the body of Antichrist. Every motive for professing to believe absurdities and contradictions will be at an end, when neither rule nor honour, nor pelf is to be gained ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... smoke and ashes into his face and beard: the result of his labour was debt instead of pelf. I sung through the burst window-panes and the yawning clefts in the walls. I blew into the chests of drawers belonging to the daughters, wherein lay the clothes that had become faded and threadbare from being worn over and over again. ...
— What the Moon Saw: and Other Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... is a tincture so strong, That, if dosing yourself, you are sure to go wrong. What men learnt in the past they say brings them no pelf, And the well-tried old remedies rest on the shelf. But the patient may haply exclaim, "Don't be rash, Lest your new-fangled ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, October 4, 1890 • Various
... nothing in itself; It but reflects the lives of men; And they who lived and toiled for pelf Went out as vipers in a den. God cleans the sky from time to time Of every tyrant flag that flies, And every brazen badge of crime Falls to the ground and swiftly dies. Proud kings are mouldering in the dust; Proud flags of ages past are gone; ...
— The Path to Home • Edgar A. Guest
... market holds forth, The best that I know for a lover of pelf, Is to buy Marcus up, at the price he is worth, And then sell him at that which he sets ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... saved old SELL-ALL'S life— 'Twas but the year before! And Sell-all rose and let him in, Not utterly unwilling, But first he bargain'd with the man, And took his only shilling! That night he dreamt he'd given away his pelf, Walk'd in his sleep, and sleeping hung himself! And now his soul and body rest below; And here they say his punishment and fate is To lie awake and every hour to know How many people read his ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... is as corrupting to vulgar souls as money, this man seems to have been as regardless as he was of pelf. He received the Cross of the Iron Crown from the Emperor of Austria. He accepted what was graciously offered, but he said that, as an Englishman, he did not know what good Crosses were to him. The circumstance reminded him that he had received other Crosses, but he had to ask ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... that it is thyself, Thy body as it was ere death was it, Towering above the silence infinite That girds round life and its unduring pelf. Even as thou wert in life, thy corporal shade Is in the presence of the gods. My love Permits not that its carnal being fade Or one whit false to fleshly presence prove. Creeds may arise and pass, and passions change, Other ways may be born out of Time's dream, But this ...
— Antinous: A Poem • Fernando Antonio Nogueira Pessoa
... soul, forget thy self! This that has haunted all the past, That conjured disappointments fast, That never could let well alone; That, climbing to achievement's throne, Slipped on the last step; this that wove Dissatisfaction's clinging net, And ran through life like squandered pelf:— This that till now has been thy self ...
— Poems of To-Day: an Anthology • Various
... Eagle-hunter, The valiant fate-confronter, The soldier brave, and blunter Of speech than BISMARCK's self? This bungler all-disgracing, This braggart all-debasing. This spurious sportsman, chasing No nobler prey than pelf? ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., September 20, 1890 • Various
... was drifting with the city's human tide, Came a ghost, and for a moment walked in silence by my side — Now my heart was hard and bitter, and a bitter spirit he, So I felt no great aversion to his ghostly company. Said the Shade: 'At finer feelings let your lip in scorn be curled, 'Self and Pelf', my friend, has ever been ...
— In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses • Henry Lawson
... Latin tongue deriv'd, Of whose sense girls are depriv'd 'Cause they do not Latin know.— But if all this anger grow From this cause, that you suspect By proceedings indirect, I would keep (as misers pelf) All this learning to myself; Sister, to remove this doubt, Rather than we will fall out, (If our parents will agree) You shall Latin learn ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... earth, Warming his hands at another's hearth: From the pomp of towns he must onward roam; In the village-green with its cheerful game, In the mirth of the vintage or harvest-home, No part or lot can the soldier claim. Tell me then, in the place of goods or pelf, What has he unless to honour himself? Leave not even this his own, what wonder The man should burn and ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... noble mind, Who loves me more than praise or pelf, Reproves my faults with spirit kind, And thinks of me ...
— Gleams of Sunshine - Optimistic Poems • Joseph Horatio Chant
... know what is good for you; you love your country as you love your pelf. You feel for the common people,—as the wolf feels for ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke
... no pelf; I pray for no man but myself; Grant I may never prove so fond, To trust man on his oath ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... Gospel texts with trading gammon, A black-leg saint, a spiritual hedger, Who backs his rigid Sabbath, so to speak, Against the wicked remnant of the week, A saving bet against, his sinful bias— "Rogue that I am," he whispers to himself, "I lie—I cheat—do any thing for pelf, But who on earth can say I am ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... - to the overwhelming power of better educated peoples; to closer intercourse between the nations; to the conviction that, from the most selfish point of view even, peace is the only path to prosperity; to the restraint of the baser Press which, for mere pelf, spurs the passions of the multitude instead of curbing them; and, finally, to deliverance from the 'all- potent wills of Little Fathers by Divine right,' and from the ignoble ambition of bullet-headed uncles ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... the house of a grave and courteous burgess of the city, who bestowed the fairest chamber on his guest. Eliduc fared softly, both at bed and board. He called to his table such good knights as were in misease, by reason of prison or of war. He charged his men that none should be so bold as to take pelf or penny from the citizens of the town, during the first forty days of their sojourn. But on the third day, it was bruited about the streets, that the enemy were near at hand. The country folk deemed that they approached to invest the city, and to take the gates ...
— French Mediaeval Romances from the Lays of Marie de France • Marie de France |
