"Useful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... been given of the phrase necessity or charity ... that it comprehends all acts which it is morally fit and proper should be done on the Sabbath may itself require some explanation. To save life, or prevent or relieve suffering; to prepare useful food for man and beast, to save property, as in case of fire, flood, or tempest ... unquestionably fall within the exception ... But if fish in the bay, or birds on the shore, happened to be uncommonly abundant on the Lord's day, it is equally clear that it would furnish no excuse for ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume II. No. 4, January, 1885 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... up such useful articles of baggage as were of light carriage, among which his trusty rifle was not forgotten, he started with his family, driving his whole stock of cattle along with him, on a pilgrimage to this new land of promise. He passed through Cincinnati on his way thither in 1798. Being enquired of as ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... desired with the dressing-comb. The effect occurs as the hair dries. When oils are preferable to hair washes, those strongly scented with the oil of rosemary, to which a few drops of oil of thyme or origanum may be added, appear to be the most useful. ...
— The Ladies Book of Useful Information - Compiled from many sources • Anonymous
... worn outfit of saddlery, and a small bank account. But his greatest asset, of which he was blissfully unconscious, was a big, homely love for things human and for animals; a love that set him apart from his fellows who looked upon men and horses and dogs as merely useful or otherwise. ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... the drive, and what made her get so tired,—that he had full occupation in warding oil the questions and turning them another way. In compliance with her wishes he had taken his usual place on the couch, and there made himself useful both with word and hand; the particular use of breakfast to him, was not ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... letter to Washington, written on the same day that he signed the treaty, Mr. Jay said, "To do more was impossible. I ought not to conceal from you," he added, "that the confidence reposed in your personal character was visible and useful throughout the negotiation." To the ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... definition of the miracle as a "power" had opened a new line of speculation. If this strange gift (already he was beginning to consider it more leniently) were concealed from others, could he not honorably put it to some useful purpose? For, among the blind, the man with one eye is a god. Was not he—among all other men the only one able to read the minds of all other men—a god? Turning into Bruton Street, he paced its quiet length considering the possibilities ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... with no hope of learned professorships to crown his career, nor venerable diplomas to assure him of social honor and position. Let him not be regarded as an idler by the wayside, nor let 'La Boheme' be any longer considered as his especial type and insignia! The useful and the beautiful should stand banded in the closest fellowship, since Truth must be the soul of both! Honor then the pure artist, while he still lives, nor keep the ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 5, November, 1863 • Various
... attract weavers, houses were built at the Company's expense, which weavers were permitted to occupy as hereditary possessions. It was formally decreed that "None but Weavers, Spinners, and other persons useful in the Weaving trade, Painters (i.e. designers of patterns for chintz), Washers (bleachers), Dyers, Bettleca-merchants (beetle-sellers), Brahmins and Dancing women, and other necessary attendants on the pagoda (erected in the settlement) shall ...
— The Story of Madras • Glyn Barlow
... the docken," promptly chimed in Bang; "it is a highly respectable vegetable, let me tell you, and useful on occasion, ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... hostility to the usurper, and that the national ferment is so great as to be almost on the verge of rebellion. I have also gained from a private communication from our friend Ramsay, who is now at Amsterdam, and in a position to be most useful to us, that the usurper has intimated to his own countrymen, although it is not yet known in England, that he will return to the Hague in July. Such, gentlemen, is the intelligence I have to impart as respects ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... me useful service to-night, citoyenne," he replied with a sarcastic smile, "I will give you that ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... The subordinate places had been filled on the principle of including in the Government every party and shade of party, the avowed Jacobites alone excepted, nay, every public man who, from his abilities or from his situation, seemed likely to be either useful in ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... I was a boy, and they told me work was honourable, useful, cleanly, sanitary, wholesome, and necessary to the mind of man, I paid no more attention to them than if they had told me that public men were usually honest, or that pigs could fly. It seemed to me that ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc
... ancestors, who are allied by common interests, profess the same religion, and speak the same language the United States have been actively instrumental. Our efforts to effect this good work will be persevered in while they are deemed useful to the parties and our entire disinterestedness continues to be felt and understood. The act of Congress to countervail the discriminating duties to the prejudice of our navigation levied in Cuba and Puerto Rico has been transmitted ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson
... chief soldier was Big Iron. His son was Little Crow, who became famous or rather infamous, as the leader against the whites in the terrible tragedy of '62. Later in May the second lesson was taught by Gideon Pond to members of the Lake Calhoun band. Both lessons were in the useful and civilizing art of plowing and were the first in that grand series of lessons, covering more than seventy years, and by which the Sioux nation have been lifted ...
— Among the Sioux - A Story of the Twin Cities and the Two Dakotas • R. J. Creswell
... which may be found useful in laying out lettering for lines of a given length, are shown in 3 in a more modern style of the Roman capital. In the classic Roman letter the cross-bar is usually in the exact center of the letter height, but in 3 the ...
— Letters and Lettering - A Treatise With 200 Examples • Frank Chouteau Brown
... only Nature which can do everything, and if the doctor is to become useful he must follow in her footsteps and serve ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... ruined this poor family seems to have conceived in the end a feeling of remorse; he turned the father out indeed, but he offered, in compensation, to charge himself with one of the sons: and Harry, the fifth child and already sickly, was chosen to be left behind. He made himself useful in the office; picked up the scattered rudiments of an education; read right and left; attended and debated at the Young Men's Christian Association; and in all his early years, was the model for a good story-book. His landlady's daughter was ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... study the ecorche in the dissecting-room, but we do not want the Apollo or the Venus to leave their skins behind them when they go into the gallery for exhibition. Lancisi's figures show us how the great statues look when divested of their natural covering. It is instructive, but useful chiefly as a means to aid in the true artistic reproduction of nature. When the, hospitals are invaded by the novelist, he should learn something from the physician as well as from the patients. Science delineates in monochrome. She never ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... I then? A miserable moonstruck mortal, duly entitled to write M.D. (of Tarrytown College, Alaska) after my name—for the title of Doctor is useful in the profession—but with no other source of enjoyment or emotional recreation in a cold, casual world. Often and often have I written M.D. after my name, till the glowing pleasure palled, and I have sunk back asking, 'Has life, then, no ...
— Much Darker Days • Andrew Lang (AKA A. Huge Longway)
... methods of instituting piety into the mind which I use with my children, may be properly and prudently used with my servants, they shall be partakers in them—Nor will I leave them ignorant of anything, wherein I may instruct them to be useful ...
— The Education Of The Negro Prior To 1861 • Carter Godwin Woodson
... mastership; the first code becoming law in 1860, the second was prepared during his lifetime, though it did not become law till a year after his death. These statutes are much less interesting reading than the early statutes, though undoubtedly more useful. While aiming at precision in the matter of rights and duties, they leave great freedom in matters of study, discipline, and administration. All local restrictions on scholarships and fellowships have been abolished. The ...
— St. John's College, Cambridge • Robert Forsyth Scott
... gentleman. Must be clean, well-behaved, and make himself useful in house. Attend to boots, coals, windows, ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... bottles; the valet and lady's maid, of clothes; most servants, indeed, of most things they may happen to lay hold of. I have been told that in sterner times loving correspondence, otherwise interdicted, may be maintained by letter through the agency of some of these useful establishments. In the Arcadian autumn, no such device is necessary. Everybody loves, and openly and blamelessly loves. My landlord's young man loves the whole of one side of the way of Old Bond-street, and is beloved several doors up New Bond- ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... no longer inky, but she spent her evenings downstairs now, was met no more among newspaper offices, and studied with a dogged patience, which assured him that she was bent on occupying her mind with something useful, if not pleasant. ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... of purpose as this inviting field of research spread out its vistas before him. Perhaps—yes, he would incidentally explore the mysteries of the Moabitic past as well, and thus put the Rev. E. Ray Mifflin to confusion on his own subject. That would in itself be a useful thing, because Mifflin wore kid gloves at the Conference, and affected an intolerable superiority of dress and demeanor, and there would be general satisfaction among the plainer and worthier brethren at seeing ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... day they might themselves become guardians. It was all very attractive. There were many duties for the girls to perform and many, many things to learn. Their days Harriet discovered, were not wholly devoted to amusement, but to learning woodcraft and other useful things. ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls Under Canvas • Janet Aldridge
... eloquent young divine, who had in no small degree saved the State of California to the Union, by his earnest and constant plea for national integrity, died in the midst of his useful and noble career: forthwith the publisher of a Review, in whose pages some of his early essays had appeared, announced their republication: in vain the friends and family of Starr King protested against so crude ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... house." The reason being rather obvious. For if you did touch the house, it would certainly fall on to your head. The next shell will bring it down, even if it's a couple of hundred yards away, merely by the vibration. We find shell holes so useful for watering the horses. They seem to retain water in a ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson
... be sure, we have learned more of the injurious effects than of the beneficial ones, but this only means that we are acquiring definite facts concerning the whole influence of electric light upon vegetation; and in some cases, notably in our lettuce tests, the light has already been found to be a useful adjunct to forcing establishments.... It is highly probable that there are certain times in the life of the plant when the electric light will prove to be particularly helpful. Many experiments show that injury ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various
... did not think anything more of it, and I went in and had my supper. While we were eating, and my back was turned, he threw the reins of my horse to a bystander, and, drawing a sword, he cut the throat of the good, useful, little horse which I had hired for him, and which he had been riding all day. I saw people running, and heard a certain amount of confusion while I was eating; but being very tired and hungry, I did not look round. Presently somebody let it out. I rose in a rage, determined to ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... I have been more actuated by a desire to render to my pupils and others, useful in-formation, than that of commencing Author on such a subject; and writing for the press has been but very little my employment, I trust that an ample excuse will be granted for any errors that may appear, or for the ...
— The Botanist's Companion, Vol. II • William Salisbury
... watched at an alligator's hole with a rifle, but the beast would not come out, perhaps luckily for me, if I missed a stomach shot; that I was prevented from bringing down a carrion vulture, it being illegal to kill those useful scavengers; that I caught some dear little green tree frogs; that I noted how the rice-fields had become a poisonous marsh; that I noticed the extensive strata of guano and fossil bone pits, securing some large dragon's teeth, and with them sundry flint ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... policeman said when the money was counted. He meant much the same thing Auld Jock himself had meant. There was enough to save him from the last indignity a life of useful labor can thrust upon the honest poor—pauper burial. But when inquiries were made for the name and the friends of this old man there appeared to be only "Auld Jock" to enter into the record, and a little dog ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson
... you must be able to paint on a larger. And it is said that Meissonier was in the habit all his life of making life-size studies in order to keep his style from falling into pettiness. So, after all, the painting of these big pictures may have been a useful ordeal for the artist who for the next sixty years was to reap ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... reformer of Great Yarmouth. This young woman, though but a poor dressmaker, conceived a device for the reformation of prisoners in her native town, and continued for twenty-four years her earnest and useful labor of love, acting as schoolmistress, chaplain and industrial superintendent. In 1835, Captain Williams, inspector of prisons, brought her plans before the Government, under the conviction that the ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... gained, by simply avoiding coarseness and vulgarity, and being well bred and agreeable. Nor can the case be otherwise. For the foundation of good breeding is good nature and good sense—two of the most useful and indispensable attributes of a well-constituted mind. Let it not be forgotten, however, that good breeding is not to be regarded as identical with politeness—a mistake which is too frequently, if not generally, committed. A person may be exceedingly ...
— How To Behave: A Pocket Manual Of Republican Etiquette, And Guide To Correct Personal Habits • Samuel R Wells
... of a settled residence might betray my abode to you. And now, there are three roads open to you. You may return with your child to the old home of the Dumanys, my poor Slav kingdom. There you may live, secluded from the world, bringing up your child and teaching him virtue, honesty, and useful employments. You may dole out alms to the poor, and in this mournful solitude pray to God for happy oblivion or the still happier news of my death. This is one of the roads open to you; it is the stony path of virtue, dreary and tiresome. The second path is the flowery one. You may throw ...
— Dr. Dumany's Wife • Mr Jkai
... lad?' See, these words I said!—that is my whole fault, but since then have lain heavy on my heart. Three years ago came the German Heinrich, and stayed two nights in our house; God forgive it us! Tricks he could play, and he understood more than the Lord's Prayer—more than is useful to a man. With one trick you were to assist him, but when he gave you the goblet you played your own tricks, and he could make nothing succeed. You would also be clever. Then he cast an evil eye upon you, although he was still so friendly ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... people generally have a desire to be useful. Sometimes not an actually formulated desire, but a vague intention which they mean some day shall have a practical issue, when and how they do not quite know, or in what way. It is proposed in this article to point out one means of eminent usefulness—i.e., that ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 353, October 2, 1886. • Various
... the court. Well—also the chirurgeons have a useful practice, by which they put their apprentices and tyrones to work; upon senseless dead bodies, to which, as they can do no good, so they certainly can do as little harm; while at the same time the tyro, or apprentice, gains experience, and becomes fit to whip off a leg or arm ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... for Japan, China, the Straits Settlements and India are the most useful. These give the best routes and describe all the principal objects of interest. Without such a guide-book, one is helpless, as the professional guides frequently omit important things which should be seen. It is needless to look for conscientiousness or honesty in the Orient. You will ...
— The Critic in the Orient • George Hamlin Fitch
... ruse was successful, and that Lefebvre, thus brought to the point, married Madame Sans Gene, and subsequently, through his own advancement, made her the Duchess of Dantzig. The anecdote suffices to show how wretchedly poor and yet how full of interest and useful to those about him Napoleon was ...
— Mr. Bonaparte of Corsica • John Kendrick Bangs
... that, like the abbreviation of words, it is vulgar. In a few high-class ladies' schools its use is sternly repressed, and there are many fluent and habitual writers who never employ this sign. This in itself supplies a useful clue to characterisation. Others, again, only employ it in such combinations as "& Co.," "&c.," though this latter abbreviation is, as often as not, written "etc." by ...
— The Detection of Forgery • Douglas Blackburn
... introduction of 'the double-faced sluice-cock.' This sluice-cock, which had now superseded every other description, was the creation of Mr. James Nasmyth's inventive genius. Mr. Marten said he well remembered the first reception of this useful invention, as he happened at that time to be a pupil of Mr. Thomas Wicksteed. He was present when Mr. Wicksteed explained to Mr. Nasmyth the want he had experienced of a sluice-cock for Waterworks purposes, ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... the author proceeds, this condition does not appear to subserve any useful purpose. "Let us, however, go back to aboriginal woman—to woman of the woods and the fields. Let us picture ourselves a young aboriginal Venus in one of her earliest hysterical paroxysms. In doing so, let us not forget some of the twelve characteristics previously mentioned. She will not ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... parent, and I the son? Would to heaven, Willy, you had done as I wished you to do, and led the life of a steady, thoughtful young man! Instead of meddling here, you should now have been in some studio, college, or professional man's chambers, engaged in a useful pursuit which might have made one proud to own you. But you were so precocious and headstrong; and this is what you have come to: ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... fruit and sepals covered with stalked glands. I have only observed the wild roses in the north of England, but there I have never seen insects attending the glands. These glands, however, do not secrete honey; but a dark, resinous, sticky liquid, that probably is useful by being distasteful to both ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... of two was graduated in 1876; since that over two hundred young people have received the diploma of the school, most of whom are living useful, self-respecting lives in the many communities where they ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 54, No. 4, October, 1900 • Various
... familiarly with loose-jointed colts, and exchange grave gambollings with solemn cows. Then shall the voice of the press, no longer attuned to the praises of the vegetable kingdom, find a more humble, but not less useful, employment in calling the animal kingdom to the evening meal ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile
... HOUSE: The 12,000 American, British, and French troops at Archangel are no longer serving any useful purpose. Only 3,000 Russians have rallied around this force. It is the attacked, not the attacker, and serves merely to create cynicism in regard to all our proposals and to stimulate recruiting for the ...
— The Bullitt Mission to Russia • William C. Bullitt
... simple instrument of action, a bundle of motive habits, a group of mechanisms which mind has set up to act. How does it operate in the work of memory? The task of the brain is every moment to thrust back into unconsciousness all that part of our past which is not at the time useful. Minute study of facts shows that the brain is employed in choosing from the past, in diminishing, simplifying, and extracting from it all that can contribute to present experience; but it is not concerned to preserve it. In short, ...
— A New Philosophy: Henri Bergson • Edouard le Roy
... writing upon matters connected, at least, with, religion, with the thought of saying something useful—of presenting a valuable experience, if not a valuable congeries of new ideas. Most readers deeply interested in religion are, by this time, demanding that I show my colors—present my creed; otherwise they will shut ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various
... amusements? Every nation in Europe, except the English, knows better how to enjoy the pleasures of life than we do. Our so-called "practical" men look upon recreation as something useless, whereas in reality it is the most useful thing in the world. Recreation is re-creation—regaining the energies lost by hard work. Those who properly alternate recreation with work, economize their brain power, and are therefore infinitely more practical than those who scorn ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... you must look after hawks, and other enemies of poultry. Especially do I hope you will never fire at our useful song-birds. If boys throughout the country would band together to protect game when out of season, they would soon have fine sport in ...
— Driven Back to Eden • E. P. Roe
... adopted a middle course. Without either restoring the costumes of the Janissaries, or even assimilating the habiliments of his troops to that which they wear in their own country, which would have inspired a strong and useful esprit de corps, he has accepted the uniform of the Zouave and Turcos of the French army. It is sufficiently Oriental to meet the object desired, and is very popular in the Sultan's army. It leaves to the wearer the free use of his limbs, but as a ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... friendship with them is still more so. And intercourse with the virtuous can never be fruitless. Therefore, one should live in the company of the righteous!" Yama said, "These words that thou hast spoken, so fraught with useful instruction, delight the heart and enhance the wisdom of even the learned. Therefore, O lady, solicit thou a second boon, except the life of Satyavan!" Savitri said, "Sometime before, my wise and intelligent father-in-law was deprived ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 2 • Translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... fact that it was Vincent who accompanied Toussaint's sons to Paris, and returned with the deputation, as I have represented; I think it best, therefore, to say here that, from all I can learn, General Vincent was an honourable and useful man, and that the delineation of character under that name in my book is purely fictitious. The following extract from Clarkson's pamphlet on Negro Improvement will show in what estimation General Vincent is held by one whose testimony is ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... conducting Nature Study lessons on plants. It is of much greater importance that the child should be led to love the flowers and to appreciate their beauty and their utility. Such appreciation will result in the desire to protect and to produce fine flowers and useful plants, and this end can be reached only through intelligent acquaintanceship. There can be no true appreciation without knowledge, and this the child gets chiefly by personal observation and experiment. With reference to the wild flowers of ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Nature Study • Ontario Ministry of Education
... prodigality of ways and forms whereby she can rid herself of any functionary in the government whenever she wants to. The officials are all shadows, save herself; she is the only reality. She allows no one to hold office more than a year—no one gets a chance to become over-popular or over-useful, and dangerous. "Excommunication" is the favorite penalty-it is threatened at every turn. It is evidently the pet dread and terror of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... as thinking them little likely so to gainsay me as that it will be incumbent upon me to reply, and shall confine myself to translating the "Odyssey" for English readers, with such notes as I think will be found useful. Among these I would especially call attention to one on xxii. 465-473 which Lord Grimthorpe has kindly allowed ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... pleasing, but does not reach a very high level of poetic writing. It is, however, a useful exercise for development of independent action of the two middle fingers of ...
— Edward MacDowell • John F. Porte
... immediately become popular I have not promised to myself: a few wild blunders, and risible absurdities, from which no work of such multiplicity was ever free, may for a time furnish folly with laughter, and harden ignorance in contempt, but useful diligence will at last prevail, and there never can be wanting some who distinguish desert; who will consider that no dictionary of a living tongue ever can be perfect, since while it is hastening to publication, some words are budding, and ...
— Mince Pie • Christopher Darlington Morley
... in the confidence of Louis XVIII., to whom his varied experience was useful. He had greatly aided in overthrowing Decazes, and had given much good advice to the ministry of Villele. Coldly received by Charles X., he had adopted all the rancors of Talleyrand. He was now in high favor under the ...
— An Historical Mystery • Honore de Balzac
... words of comfort! Goodness resides not in men, for men know not of themselves what is good. They are ignorant of their own nature and destiny. What seems good, may be evil all the while; and what is deemed useful, harmful. No man can choose the things meet for him, because he knows not his own needs, but is like the little child sitting in the meadows, that sucks for wholesome milk the juice of the deadly nightshade. The babe does ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France
... them, together with two large bundles of wood for the camp fire, which materials they had let down from point to point at the end of their ropes. Tad had learned always to carry his lasso at his belt. It was the most useful part of his equipment. He had gotten the other boys into the habit of doing the same. Rifles had been left in the camp above, as they were a burden in climbing down the rocks. But all hands carried ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Grand Canyon - The Mystery of Bright Angel Gulch • Frank Gee Patchin
... Carolina, on his plantation, called by the Indians "Culong," and by the whites, "Indian Town." Many of the students at this academy were in later days to be counted among the State's most famous and useful men. William Ferebee's family alone furnished six members of the Legislature, three Revolutionary officers, and one Colonel in the Confederacy in the War of Secession. For a hundred years this famous ...
— In Ancient Albemarle • Catherine Albertson
... right to have been deceived. Since you have found it all out through her, I may as well admit to you that it is true. She did live here. Nobody suspected her presence, or even her existence. She was very useful to me in many ways. If she had proved troublesome I could have rid myself of her at any time, and she knew it. Instead of doing what I ought to have done, I believed that she was willing to go away without betraying me, and I let her go free with a present of a thousand pounds. She could even ...
— The House by the Lock • C. N. Williamson
... Effingham, will be useful," Sir George Templemore said, after the pause had continued an awkward minute, laying a banknote of that amount on the table, "and you will honour us by becoming the keeper of the redemption money, I have great pleasure in making ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... Nation, and yourselves a dangerous and important mission. I say yourselves, because, in spite of all our beautiful lies, self is the centre of all human action. Mr. Lincoln has fortunately gone to his reward—fortunately for him and for his country. His death was necessary to save his life. He was a useful man living, more useful dead. Our party has lost its first President, but gained ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon
... took any pupils, and, as far as I can learn, never attempted to train colts by his method, although that is a more profitable and useful branch of business than training vicious horses. It is stated in an article in "Household Words" on Horse-Tamers, that he was so jealous of his gift that even the priest of Ballyclough could not wring it from him at the ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... night and day,' 1 Timothy 5:5. They are to devote themselves to the sick—to be patterns of good works—and, if needful, to be fed and clothed at the expense of the church, verse 16. If to this were added to examine and educate the children, they might be most eminently useful.—Ed. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... halberds and lanterns; while poor old Wilson was scheming like Moltke and fighting like Achilles to entrap the wild Provost of Notting Hill—Mr. Buck, retired draper, has simply driven down in a hansom cab and done something about as plain as butter and about as useful and nasty. He has gone down to South Kensington, Brompton, and Fulham, and by spending about four thousand pounds of his private means, has raised an army of nearly as many men; that is to say, an army big enough to beat, not only Wayne, but Wayne and all his ...
— The Napoleon of Notting Hill • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... own satisfaction. "Yes, one can make oneself believe in anything. I have believed in all sorts of things. In England, of course, people have believed in nothing except that things will always be as they always have been—a useful belief considering that things have never been as they always were. In the old days, when the Boer War hadn't interfered with tradition, it must have seemed to any one who wasn't a young man pretty hopeless, but now I ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... water, this heat would be of service to us, for it dilates the hydrogen in the balloon, and diminishes the amount required in the spiral, although it is true that, if we were not short of the useful liquid, we should not have to economize it. Ah! that rascally savage ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... called The Great Law. These provided that all religions should be tolerated; that all landholders and taxpayers might vote and be eligible to membership in the Assembly; that every child of twelve should be taught some useful trade; and that the prisons should be made ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... old man, "do you know what some one came to tell me in the depths of my province? That my nephew had ruined himself for you, and that the poor fellow was living in a garret while you were in silk and gold. Forgive my rustic sincerity; it may be useful for you to know of ...
— Madame Firmiani • Honore de Balzac
... rear. The Chinese gunners were driven from their pieces, but several of their officers committed suicide. The commandant of the chief fort drowned himself in the face of both armies. The capture of Amoy remained barren of useful results. The British fleet proceeded northward until scattered by a hurricane in the Channel of Formosa. Coming together off Ningpo, the fleet attacked Chusan for the second time. Spirited resistance was ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... neighbour is to fortify itself within; we do not mean by land armies, which rather debilitate than strengthen a country, but by potent navies, by thrift in the public treasure, care of the people's trade, and all the other honest and useful arts ...
— Essays on Mankind and Political Arithmetic • Sir William Petty
... withdrawn from the neighbourhood, Kenneth was taken by King Malachy's men, and the traitor himself drowned in a sack, in the little river Nanny, which divides the two baronies of Duleek. This death-penalty by drowning seems to have been one of the useful hints which the Irish ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... lay figures there is none on earth so useful as a wooden husband. You should get a wooden husband, my dear, if you want to be left in peace. It is like a comfortable slipper or your dressing-gown after a ball. It is like springs to your carriage. It is like a clever maid who never ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... family spread Jim's letter, as he said, before the Lord, and asked for guidance. The end of the whole matter was that, a few months later, the Thorogood family emigrated to the backwoods of America, and began that career of useful, energetic, patient, God-directed labour which ended in the formation of a happy garden in a part of the wilderness which had formerly been the haunt of wild beasts and ...
— The Thorogood Family • R.M. Ballantyne
... law-suit may deprive him of his field; through this field he may be harassed in all sorts of ways. But if the artisan is ill-treated his goods are soon packed and he takes himself off. Yet agriculture is the earliest, the most honest of trades, and more useful than all the rest, and therefore more honourable for those who practise it. I do not say to Emile, "Study agriculture," he is already familiar with it. He is acquainted with every kind of rural labour, it was his first occupation, and he returns to it continually. So I say ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... well aware that there are numerous others that I might cite were my acquaintance with practical nut culture more extensive than it is. The one that I know about of my own personal knowledge is, a very good example of the plain common sense of productive trees which combine the useful ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Sixth Annual Meeting. Rochester, New York, September 1 and 2, 1915 • Various
... footsteps rapidly paced passages, and pattered up and down stairs. Andy was the nimblest at the hall-door at the first summons of the bell; and, in a livery too short in the arms and too wide in the shoulders, he bustled here and there, his anxiety to be useful only putting him in everybody's way, and ending in getting him a hearty ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... needs. To weave knowledge into action is the antidote for ennui. To plan, to hope, to do, to accomplish the full measure of our powers, whatever they may be, is to turn away from Nirvana to real life. A useful man, a helpful man, an active man in any sense, even though his, activity be misdirected or harmful, ...
— The Philosophy of Despair • David Starr Jordan
... abstinence—should be invited to send delegates, who should be equally welcome to its platform and eligible to its offices. An Orthodox White Male Adult Saints' Convention may be very proper and very useful, but it should be called distinctly as such, and not unqualifiedly as a ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... man who is now farming and cannot leave his farm or for the younger man as a preparation for the short courses, one or more correspondence courses will be found useful. Not all colleges conduct correspondence courses, but fortunately those who do will accept students from other states on equal terms. There are many persons who will ...
— The Young Farmer: Some Things He Should Know • Thomas Forsyth Hunt
... he called on two ancient intimates, Lord Heddon, and his distant cousin Darley Absworthy, both Members of Parliament, useful men, though gouty, who had sown in their time a fine crop of wild oats, and advocated the advantage of doing so, seeing that they did not fancy themselves the worse for it. He found one with an imbecile son and the other with consumptive ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... shoulder, and another doing its best to skin him alive; while her beak was hammering the gray top of his weasely-looking head. True, the male genet's fangs were buried up to the socket in the owl's throat, but that was no proof that he had found either her windpipe or the equally useful jugular vein, and, if he did not pretty quick, it looked as if it would never matter, so far ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... gross but useful animal, which can, by feeding, be stuffed into such a state of fatness as only one who has seen a Christmas cattle show in England could believe it possible for beast to acquire. Dean Ramsay, in a happy anecdote, refers to a good ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... birds. Unfortunately we had neither the time to, nor the opportunity of making any such collection, though we might easily have filled them with specimens of the desert house-fly which swarm at every well! By sawing off the ends of these lids we had two useful boxes, with neither top nor bottom, and by screwing them on to a framework of wood we manufactured a most useful caisson, 2 feet deep by 1 1/2 long and 1 foot wide. By forcing this into the sand in the well ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... flora is too great; but a simple list in close columns in small type of all the species, genera, and families, each consecutively numbered, has always struck me as most useful; and Hooker regrets that he did not give such list in introduction to New Zealand and other Flora. I am sure I have given you a larger dose of questions than you bargained for, and I have kept my word and treated you just as I do Hooker. Nevertheless, if anything occurs ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... looks very nice on the outside; for though the roses and honeysuckles which we have planted against it are only of this year's growth, yet it is covered all over with green leaves and scarlet flowers; for we have trained scarlet beans upon threads, which are not only exceedingly beautiful but very useful, as their produce is immense. We have made a lodging-room of the parlour below stairs, which has a stone floor, therefore we have covered it all over with matting. We sit in a room above stairs, and we have one lodging-room with two single beds, ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers
... exceedingly useful in cooking. It is cheaper to buy them ready made, under the name of Herbaceous Mixture. They can, however, be made at home as follows:—Take two ounces of white peppercorns, two ounces of cloves, one ounce of marjoram, one ounce of sweet basil ...
— Cassell's Vegetarian Cookery - A Manual Of Cheap And Wholesome Diet • A. G. Payne
... (or Ivins, to adopt the pronunciation most in vogue with her circle of acquaintance) had adopted in early life the useful pursuit of shoe-binding, to which she had afterwards superadded the occupation of a straw-bonnet maker. Herself, her maternal parent, and two sisters, formed an harmonious quartett in the most secluded portion of Camden-town; and here it was that Mr. ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... be asked why I should have so strong an objection to seeing protoplasm as the only living substance, when I find this view so useful to me as tending to substantiate design—which I admit that I have as much and as seriously at heart as I can allow myself to have any matter which, after all, can so little affect daily conduct; I reply that ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... may fancy this is caricature; but the abyss of confusion produced by modern science in nomenclature, and the utter void of the abyss when you plunge into it after any one useful fact, surpass all caricature. I have in my hand thirteen plates of thirteen species of eagles; eagles all, or hawks all, or falcons all—whichever name you choose for the great race of the hook-headed birds of prey—some so like that you can't tell the ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin
... which is a sword such as no king has; steel and stone are one to it; if you bring it down on a rock it will not be injured, and it will cleave whatever you strike. Thirdly, there is the dagger which the sage Timus himself made; this is most useful, and the man who wears it would not bend under seven camels' loads. What you have to do first is to get to the home of the Simurgh[10], and to make friends with him. If he favours you, he will take you to Waq of Qaf; if not, you will ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... its re-emergence; and with cause. The resentments it left went underground and later had a revival in the passionate zeal with which the Quebec clergy embraced the faith of nationalism as preached by Bourassa. In one respect the school question and its settlement proved useful. It was the exhibit unfailingly displayed to prove upon needed occasions that the charge was quite untrue that in directing party policy Laurier was unduly sensitive to Quebec sentiment. In effect it was said: "Laurier made Quebec swallow in 1896; now it is your turn"—a ...
— Laurier: A Study in Canadian Politics • J. W. Dafoe
... up and married him, just like anybody else would have done. He didn't want her to travel with the troupe, so when they reached Chicago they thought that would be a good place, and they stopped, while he hunted work. It was slow business, because he never had been taught to do a useful thing, and he didn't even know how to hunt work, least of all to do it when he found it; so pretty soon things were going wrong. But if he couldn't find work, she could always sing, so she sang at night, and made little ...
— Freckles • Gene Stratton-Porter
... the living, Health to Miss Harlowe; which Lord M. obligingly began, and, To the happy reconciliation; and then we stuck in a remembrance To honest Jack Belford, who, of late, we all agreed, is become an useful and humane man; and one who prefers his friend's ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... broke in. "I can give you the dates of the decisions." He rose from his chair, glad of an opportunity to be useful. "I have the books," he said, and took one from the case and brought it ...
— Damaged Goods - A novelization of the play "Les Avaries" • Upton Sinclair
... answered: "Never may that man, O Idomeneus, return from Troy, but let him here be the sport of the dogs, whosoever voluntarily this day shall relax from fighting. But come, taking up arms, advance hither; for it behoves us to hasten these things, if we may be of any service, although but two; for useful is the valour of men, even the very pusillanimous, if combined, whereas we both understand how to fight even with ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... wondering, ever so long ago, what this strange Thing called a Man of Learning was, and what is it that constitutes a Scholar? For, said I, here's a man speaks five Languages and reads the Sixth, is a master of Astronomy, Geography, History, and abundance of other useful Knowledge (which I do not mention, that you may not guess at the Man, who is too Modest to desire it), and yet, they say ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... of every human being; and when they are developed, then culture is perfect, either in the individual or in the nation or the race. These five primitive ideas, innate in every human soul, are the ideas of the useful, of the beautiful, of the just, of the good and of the true, and you will not find any savage (provided he is not deficient in the ordinary mental ability of his tribe) who does not indicate an appreciation of every one of these in his own way. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1178, June 25, 1898 • Various
... that Mrs. Cork had disappointed him in the hopes he had had of her, to have the old woman, as it were, on his hands. True she could be useful enough in many ways to him, by doing the housework, the cooking and mending, but still he was anxious since his secret was in her keeping, and the more now that she had tried her hand with his wife and failed. For he saw that vanity had kept her mouth shut if she had won over her mistress ...
— Lady Into Fox • David Garnett
... the world, and could tell you nothing but the signs of the tippling-houses, and the price and quality of the liquor. On the other hand, Franklin could not cross the Channel without making observations useful to mankind. While many a vacant thoughtless youth is whirled through Europe without gaining a single idea worth crossing the street for, the observing eye and inquiring mind find matter of improvement and delight ...
— Madam How and Lady Why - or, First Lessons in Earth Lore for Children • Charles Kingsley
... slave, and she bores him. De Marsay cares very little about her. If you will introduce her to me, you will be her darling, her Benjamin; she will idolize you. If, after that, you can love her, do so; if not, make her useful. I will ask her to come once or twice to one of my great crushes, but I will never receive her here in the morning. I will bow to her when I see her, and that will be quite sufficient. You have shut the Comtesse de Restaud's door against you by mentioning Father ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... will carry us to the very end. I am quite well, though a little fatigued sometimes." On the 24th, he writes to another friend, "To-day is the first we have rested since leaving home, so that I am almost overcome with fatigue. Do not be idle; improve in all useful knowledge. You know what an enemy I ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar
... liberality sometimes to Nestorians, sometimes to Jews. It mattered not in what country a man was born, nor what were his religious opinions; his attainment in learning was the only thing to be considered. The great Khalif Al-Mamun had declared that "they are the elect of God, his best and most useful servants, whose lives are devoted to the improvement of their rational faculties; that the teachers of wisdom are the true luminaries and legislators of this world, which, without their aid, would again sink into ignorance ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper
... be bestowed with a probability of it being judiciously laid out. Wherever their memories fell short, Miss Ainley or Miss Hall, if applied to, could help them out; but both ladies took care not to speak unless spoken to. Neither of them wanted to be foremost, but each sincerely desired to be useful; and useful the clergy consented to make them—with which boon ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... you can get a very good donkey. It would be useful to Maddalena. She could go to the village sometimes then—she could go to Marechiaro ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens
... answered Filippo, "cast your eyes on the ground and look not at them, for that they are an ill thing." Quoth the son, "And how are they called?" The father, not to awaken in the lad's mind a carnal appetite less than useful, would not name them by the proper name, to wit, women, but said, "They are called green geese." Whereupon, marvellous to relate, he who have never seen a woman and who recked not of palaces nor oxen nor horses nor asses nor monies nor of aught else he had seen, said suddenly, ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio |
