"Aloof" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... up quickly at this unusual generosity, yet she was, she realized, more startled than surprised. For had not little Rose been the one creature Martin had loved and to whom he had enjoyed giving pleasure? It had been charming—the response of the big, aloof man to the merry child of seven, but that child was now a woman, and, in all probability, a beautiful one. Wasn't there danger of far more complicated emotions which might prove even uprooting in their consequences? ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius
... existing in a degree unknown in England. Can anything be more absurd than the differences of rank that divide the population of our provincial towns? The same thing is seen in the country, where the clergyman holds aloof from the village doctor, the farmer from the shopkeeper, both these from the village schoolmaster, and where, indeed, everybody thinks himself ...
— Holidays in Eastern France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... keep every storm aloof, And kiss away the tears they weep! Ye skies, that make their only roof, Look ...
— Poems of Henry Timrod • Henry Timrod
... changed in his opinions), and passed over to Greece, where he was finally overcome by the dictator, and owed his subsequent opportunities for study to the clemency of his conqueror, who gave him pardon after the battle of Pharsalia. All the rest of his life was passed aloof from the storm that raged around him, the circumstances of his proscription and pardon being the only indication of his personal connection with it. He died in the year 28 B.C., after the temple of Janus had been closed the third time, when Augustus had entered ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... Phineus, fearful hand to hand to meet The foe, his javelin hurl'd, the point ill-aim'd On Idas glanc'd, who vainly kept aloof With neutral weapon. Phineus, stern he view'd, "With threatening frown, exclaiming;—"though no share "In this mad broil I took, now, Phineus, feel "The power of him whom thou hast forc'd a foe; "And take reciprocally ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid
... Only Cyril held himself aloof. But that he was not oblivious of the proceedings below him was evidenced by the somber bass that floated down from his piano strings. Cyril always played according to the mood that was on him; and when Bertram heard this morning the rhythmic ...
— Miss Billy • Eleanor H. Porter
... not reproach me," said he. "I shall never cease to reproach myself for letting her go where she did." And yet his heart told him that he had only acted according to his deliberate design of keeping aloof from all Margaret's pursuits and amusements that were not shared with her sister. And as for the risk, he had seen fifty people walking across the ice this very morning. Judging by the event, however, he very sincerely ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... speak out with an uncompromising and highly disconcerting directness. As I said just now, they are held, if at all, by a long and loose chain to the graven images to which we stand bound arm-to-arm and foot-to-foot. They fly far enough aloof to take a bird's-eye view. What they see they declare with a boldness which is the more impressive for being unconscious. And they declare that they see us tied to stupid material gods, ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... deal of what he meant, for one of the Baptist ministers of Philadelphia had said to me, with some shame, that at first it used actually to be the case that when Dr. Conwell would enter one of the regular ministers' meetings, all would hold aloof, not a single one stepping forward to meet ...
— Acres of Diamonds • Russell H. Conwell
... sons of the earth embellish themselves with ornaments, they shine resplendent in their persons with (brilliant) decorations; they keep aloof every adversary: the waters follow ...
— The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies • Robert Gordon Latham
... influence over European thought by the wit and tone of his writings, notably the "Praise of Folly," the "Colloquia" and "Adagia"; he has been regarded as the precursor of the Reformation; is said to have laid the egg which Luther hatched; aided the Reformation by his scholarship, though he kept aloof as a scholar from the popular movement of ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... be. And therefore, unless he be a fool, he can never be without fear that, either on the morrow or on the selfsame day, the grisly cruel hangman Death, who from his first coming in hath ever hoved aloof and looked toward him, and ever lain in wait for him, shall amid all his royalty and all his main strength neither kneel before him nor make him any reverence, nor with any good manner desire him to come forth. But he shall rigorously and fiercely grip him by the ...
— Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation - With Modifications To Obsolete Language By Monica Stevens • Thomas More
... and after a long and heated canvass adoption occurred in Virginia by a majority of only ten in a vote of 168; in New York by the narrow majority of two. Even now North Carolina and Rhode Island remained aloof. The former, not liking the prospect of isolation, came into the Union November 21, 1789, after the new government had been some time at work. Rhode Island, owing to her peculiar history in the matter of religious liberty, ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... the young man. The calm effrontery of him, the cleverness of him, to ask a favor of her! She turned from him to the distant ranges. She did not realize how much she turned from the roughness of the camp to the far desert views! Brooding, aloof, how big the ranges were, how free, how calm! For the first time her keeping Kut-le in Coventry seemed foolish to her. Of what avail was her silence, except to increase her own loneliness? Suddenly she smiled grimly. The game was a good one. Perhaps ...
— The Heart of the Desert - Kut-Le of the Desert • Honore Willsie Morrow
... occasions, something so decisive and emphatic, that one entirely approves of the course of the male in not meddling or offering any suggestions. It is the wife's enterprise, and she evidently knows her own mind so well that the husband keeps aloof, or plays the part of an ...
— Bird Stories from Burroughs - Sketches of Bird Life Taken from the Works of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... Don Roderick?—E'en as one who spies Flames dart their glare o'er midnight's sable woof, And hears around his children's piercing cries, And sees the pale assistants stand aloof; While cruel Conscience brings him bitter proof, His folly, or his crime, have caused his grief; And while above him nods the crumbling roof, He curses earth and Heaven—himself in chief - Desperate of ...
— Some Poems by Sir Walter Scott • Sir Walter Scott
... There was not even a rumor that he had ever taken an interest in any Cree girl. Of course she did not like him—not the way she did Win Beresford or even Onistah—but she was glad he held himself aloof. It would have greatly disappointed her to learn of any ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... the only safeguard for him; but aside from the fact that his reputation of reckless huntsman and general scapegrace naturally kept aloof the daughters of the nobles, and even the Langarian middle classes, he dreaded more than anything else in the world the monotonous regularity of conjugal life. He did not care to be restricted always ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... been considering the law of blood-revenge as purely an affair between the clans concerned; the rest of the tribal public keeping aloof, very much in the style of the Andamanese bystanders who retire into the jungle when there is a prospect of a row. But with the development of a central authority, whether in the shape of the rule of many or of one, the public control of the blood-feud begins to assert itself; ...
— Anthropology • Robert Marett
... English spirit revolted against the idea of the rule of Spain, and the great Catholic nobles hastened, when the moment of danger arrived, to join in the defence of their country, while Scotland, seeing no advantage to be gained in the struggle, stood sullenly aloof, and France gave no aid to a project which was to result, if successful, in the aggrandizement of ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... of kine, and a fixed pillar of dust caused by the incessant passing of the beasts to the river to drink. In the evening the children of the City came to the waste place to fly their kites, and Ephraim's sons held aloof, watching the sport from the roof, but never descending to take part in them. At the back of the house stood a small brick enclosure, in which Ephraim prepared the daily meat for his people after the custom of the Jews. Once the rude door of the square was suddenly smashed open by a struggle from ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... family in the province, where the abject worship of aristocracy sinks the burgess beneath the level of the servant and the agricultural labourer; and his retired style of life and the mystery and silence of his old palace, added to his handsome income, seemed to exalt him to an atmosphere aloof from the darts ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... situation in that way. He was, moreover, entirely devoid of personal ambition, and had no vulgar longing for personal power. After resigning his commission he returned quietly to Mount Vernon, but he did not hold himself aloof from public affairs. On the contrary, he watched their course with the utmost anxiety. He saw the feeble Confederation breaking to pieces, and he soon realized that that form of government was an utter failure. In a time when no American ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... growl of chagrin and wonder at the various incidents which had converted his mansion, first into an hospital for a wounded duellist, and now into the sick chamber of a dying nobleman. "And yet," said he, "I have always kept aloof from the soldiery and the peerage. My coenobitium has only next to be made a lying-in hospital, and then, I trow, the transformation will ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... her eyes and looked at him, where she sat oddly aloof from those possessions of hers, to which she seemed so little related, and said, with a smile quivering at the corners of her pretty mouth, "I don't see what that ...
— Between The Dark And The Daylight • William Dean Howells
... observed that the two boats, although bound for the same islet, did not row in company. They were beached as far from each other as the little bay into which they ran would admit of, and the crews stood aloof ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... American colonies into open rebellion. England feared, and the colonies hoped, Canada would join in the revolt against her. But, though they did not love their new masters, prudence counselled the Canadians to stand aloof, at least till the Americans had proved their ability to make head against the might ...
— Burgoyne's Invasion of 1777 - With an outline sketch of the American Invasion of Canada, 1775-76. • Samuel Adams Drake
... Musketeers, with violet liveries and Mitres broidered on their cartouch-boxes, to keep the Prince Bishop from coming to harm. My Master dined with this Reverend Personage, although Mr. Hodge, to maintain the purity of his cloth, kept aloof from any such Papistical entertainment; but I was of the party, it being my duty to wait behind the Squire's chair. We dined at two of the clock on very rich meats, high spiced, as I have usually found Princes and Bishops to like their victuals (for the Plainer ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... great deal. You will learn that the accoutrements of truth are a grievously heavy coat of mail. You will call forth reaction. Even that is the least. But reaction will come about in your own mind; after a long time, I mean. Still, you are strong; it will be a reaction of the kind that keeps aloof in order to spring farther and better. Your unity will not go to pieces. You are a kind ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... of the command aloof from the intrenchments, so as to start them out on the Danville Road early in the morning, supposing that Lee would be gone during the night. During the night I strengthened Sheridan by sending him ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant
... exclusiveness is very marked. Each circle would think it a degradation to mix on familiar terms with the members of the circle beneath it. In small towns and villages, you will find distinct coteries holding aloof from each other, perhaps despising each other, and very often pelting each other with hard words. The cathedral towns, generally, have at least six of such distinct classes, ranking one beneath ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles
... Morrell," said Suzette, with rather a haughty distance; but Matt felt that she kept aloof with the pride of a person who comes from an infected house, and will not put herself at the risk of avoidance. "I wished to see Dr. Morrell about my sister. She isn't well. Will you kindly ask ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... ere yet again Wakes the fierce rebound of pain, While the evil holds aloof, Thou, with bit of diamond proof, Curb thy cry, with forced will Seeming to do ...
— The Seven Plays in English Verse • Sophocles
... of the house held aloof from him. Once a day O'Hara came in to see to the wound, but he maintained a well-nigh complete silence over his work, and answered questions only with a brief yes or no. Sometimes he did not answer them at all. The old Michel came ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... she made no answer to this question, and seemed as if she had not heard it, but presently it appeared that her silence had been caused by the effect of consideration, for at length she said, still retaining her aloof attitude: ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... companions, with the hills and hanging woods, the brooks and lonely waterpools; books, the thoughts of books, the stirrings of imagination, all fused into one phantasy by the magic of the outland country. He held himself aloof from the walls of the fort; he was content to see the heaped mounds, the violent height with faerie bulwarks, from the gate in the lane, and to leave all within the ring of oaks in the mystery of his boyhood's vision. He professed to laugh at himself and at his fancies of that hot August afternoon, ...
— The Hill of Dreams • Arthur Machen
... walked home from the city. The full moon was about three hours above the eastern horizon; the entire countryside had the solemn stillness of a summer night; our footfalls and the ceaseless song of the katydids were the only sound aloof. Black shadows of bordering trees lay athwart the road, which, in the short reaches between, gleamed a ghostly white. As we approached the gate to our dwelling, whose front was in shadow, and in which no light shone, my father ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce
... relative situations had probably something to do with it, and yet it was wonderful that two such excellent persons should so thoroughly detest each other. Miss R.'s aversion was of the cold, phlegmatic, contemptuous, provoking sort; she kept aloof, and said nothing. Madame's was acute, fiery, and loquacious; she not only hated Miss R., but hated for her sake knowledge, and literature, and wit, and, above all, poetry, which she denounced as something fatal and contagious, like ...
— A Walk from London to Fulham • Thomas Crofton Croker
... chief executive Count Henry Kasimir II. of Nassau-Dietz, a third cousin of the Prince of Orange. The stadholder of Friesland was not on good terms with his great relative, and under his lead Friesland stood somewhat aloof from the policies of the latter and of Their High Mightinesses the States-General of the United Provinces. The title His Royal Highness would be given to the Prince of Orange by Andros because of his recent marriage (1677) to the Princess Mary, daughter of the Duke of York ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... time, and in the other, upon the definite and unquestioned conceptions of a complete and systematic theology. Yet, typical though they are, it is easy to exaggerate their simplicity, and it will be interesting to see how John Bunyan, supposed to be a pure idealist, aloof from the world in which he lived, yet had the most intimate and even literary connection with that world. Pepys had certain curious and characteristic outlets upon the spiritual region, but he seems to have closed them all, and become ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... of her coming it was he who, in pursuance of his method of reserve, had held aloof. He had been frequently absent from New York, and, even when there, had lived much at one or another of his clubs. Weeks had already passed when the perception stole on him that his goings and comings meant little more ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... not live alone, a wife brings all that is best into a man's life; it is she who weaves sweet dreams into his dull sleep. You know nothing of all this as yet; and your worthy old friend—to whom my greetings—has held aloof from it all his life. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... watch—which had a picture of Marie pasted inside the back of the case, by the way. "Ee?" he inquired, with a pitiful little catch in his breath, and held it up for Bud to see the busy little second hand. "Ee?" he smiled tearily and tried to show Cash, sitting aloof on his bench beside the head of his bunk and staring into the fire. But Cash gave no sign that he heard or saw anything save the visions his memory was conjuring in the ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... to be a Robinson Crusoe. At rare intervals he flitted like a frost-bitten apparition through the main street of Portsmouth, which he always designated as "the Bank," a name that had become obsolete fifty or a hundred years before. Thus, for nearly a quarter of a century, Benjamin Lear stood aloof from human intercourse. In his old age some of the neighbors offered him shelter during the tempestuous winter months; but he would have none of it—he defied wind and weather. There he lay in his dilapidated hovel in his last illness, refusing to allow any one to remain with him overnight—and ...
— An Old Town By The Sea • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... time after the rest were assembled. I was curious to see how he would comport himself to Mrs. Graham. A slight bow was all that passed between them on his entrance; and having politely greeted the other members of the company, he seated himself quite aloof from the young widow, between ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... respected through the examples offered by early masters like Albrecht Durer and Rembrandt, has still to be fully appreciated. It has come to the public slowly, the layman who likes and buys pictures more often holding aloof from the thing called an etching. That there is now a closer acquaintance than before is due in large measure to Joseph Pennell. Working through the practical, he allied his art years ago with such subjects as bridge and railroad building, ...
— The Jewel City • Ben Macomber
... age ... was removed from a depreciation and rejection of war is shown by the attitude assumed by a spirit so pathetically calm and aloof as Jean Paul, who nevertheless called war the strengthening iron cure of humanity, and maintained, indeed, that this held good more for the side which suffers than for that which wins. The fever caused by the wounds of war was, in his opinion, better than the jail fever of a loathsome peace.—PROF. ...
— Gems (?) of German Thought • Various
... question—perhaps an insoluble one—which they have mostly agitated is, what were the motives which first induced men to respect each other's possessions? It may still be put, without much hope of finding an answer to it, in the form of any inquiry into the reasons which led one composite group to keep aloof from the domain of another. But, if it be true that far the most important passage in the history of Private Property is its gradual elimination from the co-ownership of kinsmen, then the great point of inquiry is identical with that which lies on the threshold of all historical law—what were the ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine
... nice little fortune, afterwards held her head very high. Later, in consequence of some little indiscretions of her brother at the time when he was set free in the world—the result of the popular superstition held by him that "the world owed him a living,"—she held herself aloof from ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... Caldigate kept himself aloof from Mrs. Smith, not at all because he had ceased to notice her or to think about her, but from a feeling of dislike to exhibit rivalry with his friend. Shand was making himself very particular, and ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... And now, aloof from camp and field, You spend your sunny autumn hours Where the green folds of Chiltern shield The nooks of Thames amid the flowers: You who have borne that name of pride, In honour clean from fear or stain, Which Talbot won by Henry's side In ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan
... came as comes the night, And, seated from the ships aloof, sent forth An arrow; terrible was heard the clang Of that resplendent bow. At first he smote The mules and the swift dogs, and then on man He turned the deadly arrow. All around Glared evermore the ...
— The Story of Troy • Michael Clarke
... and view the Pearl of Spain, the Orient Fair One, the rich One too, and I will be respected, I bear my Patent here, I will talk to her, And when your Captain's Ships shall stand aloof, And pick your Noses, I will pick ...
— Rule a Wife, and Have a Wife - Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (3 of 10) • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... sullen, thundering river, with its swift, changeful, endless, contending strife—for that was tragic. And she rejected the frowning mass of red rock, upreared, riven and split and canyoned, so grim and aloof—for that was barren. But she accepted the vast sloping valley of sage, rolling gray and soft and beautiful, down to the dim mountains and purple ramparts of the horizon. Lucy did not know what she yearned for, she did not know why the desert called to her, she did not ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... soul within a woman's hair, And be mere Fortune's lackeyed groom,—I swear I love it not! these things are less to me Than the thin foam that frets upon the sea, Less than the thistledown of summer air Which hath no seed: better to stand aloof Far from these slanderous fools who mock my life Knowing me not, better the lowliest roof Fit for the meanest hind to sojourn in, Than to go back to that hoarse cave of strife Where my white soul first kissed the ...
— Poems • Oscar Wilde
... husbands, who are not born loves, but recipients of that love from their wives; and on this account, so far as they receive it, so far the wives enter with their love; but so far as they do not receive it, so far the wives stand aloof with their love, and wait in expectation. This is the case with chaste wives; but it is otherwise with the unchaste. From these considerations it is evident, that conjugial love resides with the wives, but that their love depends on ...
— The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love • Emanuel Swedenborg
... pathos, she repeated to herself Hood's "Song of the Shirt," and said, under her breath, "'Stitch, stitch, stitch, till the cock is crowing aloof,' ...
— Patty's Success • Carolyn Wells
... together, as their interests would naturally dictate, the Emperor could never stir, but with their permission. France seems, however, to have taken the worst of all parties, that is, none at all. She folds her arms, lets the two empires go to work to cut up Turkey as they can, and holds Prussia aloof, neither as a friend nor foe. This is withdrawing her opposition from the two empires, without the benefit of any condition whatever. In the mean time, England has clearly overreached herself. She excited the war between the Russians and Turks, in hopes that France, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... that he had no will in his possession. At this time he kept aloof from the house and showed no disposition to meddle with the affairs of the family. Indeed, all through these trying days he behaved honestly, if not with high feeling. In recounting the doings of Brown, Jones, and Robinson, it will sometimes be necessary ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... aloof on god-like wings, Taking no thought of wire or mud, Saps, smells or bugs—the mundane things That sour our lives and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, January 26, 1916 • Various
... His men and officers had unbounded respect for him, that was not wholly unmixed with fear; for while he was considerate, and asked for no exposure to danger in which he did not share, his steady discipline was never relaxed, and he kept himself almost wholly aloof, except as their military relations required contact. He could not, therefore, be popular among the hard- swearing, rollicking, and convivial cavalrymen. In a long period of inaction he might have become very unpopular, ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... not in debt to any extent, it was simply his vanity, a false pride that would not permit him to face the little world in which he lived. Those who should have advised him censured; those who had influence for good held aloof. He went to a big city, to Pittsburg, to seek his fortune among strangers, return rich, reward all who were kind to him and humble all who ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field
... rising celebrity, and, thanks to Donna Tullia, was invited to most of the great receptions and balls of that season, though he was not yet anywhere on a footing of intimacy. Gouache was proud, and would perhaps have stood aloof altogether rather than be treated as one of the herd who are asked "with everybody," as the phrase goes; but he was of an observing turn of mind, and it amused him immensely to stand unnoticed, following the movements of society's planets, comets, and satellites, and studying the many types ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... a chorus of raucous laughter came to his ears. He glared belligerently at a group of newcomers who stood aloof from his own gathering. Seven or eight of them there were, and they wore the gray with obvious discomfort. Slummers! Well, they'd hear something they could carry back with them when they returned ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... quietly. The strangely aloof acknowledgment of Crossman's possible relation to this woman, his woman, who yet was not his or any man's, somehow shocked Crossman. His blood flamed at the thought, and yet he felt her intangible, unreal. He had but to look into her shifting, glittering ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... once in a while women threw armfuls of fuel on the blaze. The tree hyraxes, out-screeched and outnumbered, fell into silence or withdrew. Above the stars shone serenely; and all about stood the trees of the ancient forest. Outside the hot, leaping red light they drew back aloof and still. They had seen many dances, many ebbs and flows of men's passions; for ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al
... leant over the low white wall and gazed into grey shivering gardens. So could they show aloof contempt; so could they elude the ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... the white race never really united or amalgamated outside of Canada. The Indian has always held aloof from us, and even as late as Sitting Bull's time that noted cavalry officer said to the author that the white people who simply came over in the Mayflower could not marry into his family on that ground. He wanted to know why they had to come ...
— Comic History of the United States • Bill Nye
... shores piled high with broken ice and snow, through a misty air to distant mountains that lifted themselves imperiously aloof, white spires against the sky,—over a forest all draped in winter robes; shore, mountains, and forest alike were chill and hushed and desolate. The lake spread its forty-odd miles in a boomerang curve from Roaring Springs to Fort Douglas, a cold, ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... as before, And with bright eyes and tender hands outspread Restored me to the Eden I had lost. Never a word of cold reproof, No sharp reproach, no glances that accuse The culprit whom they hold aloof,— Ah, 'tis not thus that other women use The empire they have won! For there is none like you, beloved,—none Secure enough to do what you have done. Where did you learn this heavenly art,— You sweetest and most wise of all that live,— With silent welcome ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke
... meeting other men face to face, as equals, they are claiming no merit because of birth, no authority because of rank; they are, perhaps, even working with their hands. Whereas our business is to keep aloof from the world, to maintain a barrier of caste between ourselves and other men, for they must not suspect that we are as imperfect as they—that we have the same appetites and passions, the same defects and meannesses. Our business is ...
— Affairs of State • Burton E. Stevenson
... reads exactly like the story of Goethe and Schiller. It was Schiller who held aloof and was full of fault-finding criticism: it was Goethe who made all the advances and did all the kindnesses. It was Goethe who obtained for Schiller that place as professor of history at Jena which gave Schiller the leisure needed for his dramatic work. ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... to the Craft—according to the custom of the time, they all lived in the same quarter and were well known to each other—were persuaded or compelled to belong to the Guild. Here religion stepped in, for every Guild had its own patron saint, and if a craftsman stood aloof, he lost the protection and incurred the displeasure of that saint, so that, apart from considerations of the common weal, terror of how the offended saint might punish the blackleg forced men to join. Thus, St. George protected the armourers; St. Mary ...
— As We Are and As We May Be • Sir Walter Besant
... began to whistle softly to himself as he paced the deck, and to glance towards the man who had taken his place with no friendly eyes. But a sort of shame held him as yet, and he kept aloof. ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... predatory stage proper the distinction between the leisure and the labouring class is in some degree a ceremonial distinction only. The able bodied men jealously stand aloof from whatever is in their apprehension, menial drudgery; but their activity in fact contributes appreciably to the sustenance of the group. The subsequent stage of quasi-peaceable industry is usually characterised by an established chattel slavery, herds of cattle, and ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen
... who made nothing of snatching a hair ribbon. But the face in that instant of dream was the face of Miss Katharine Lansdale, and coupled with the vision was a prescience that in some later life I should again look back and see myself as now, a grown but awkward boy, still holding aloof—still adoring from some remote background while other and bolder gallants captured trophies and lightly carolled their serenades. It seemed like borrowing trouble to look still farther into the future, but the vision was striking. Surely, History does repeat ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... predominating, he attended his royal patron in this battle, and being shot in the belly, died in a few minutes. The persons of distinction who fell on the other side were the lords Dongan and Carlingford, sir Neile O'Neile, and the marquis of Hoequincourt. James himself stood aloof during the action on the hill of Dunmore, surrounded with some squadrons of horse; and seeing victory declare against him, retired to Dublin without having made the least effort to re-assemble his broken forces. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... Chinese are a haughty and independent race of people, whose commercial policy it is to prohibit, as much as possible, every species of manufactures[8] and bullion; and encourage the importation of food, and raw produce; holding themselves aloof from Europeans, and particularly jealous of Great Britain, on account of the proximity of her Indian empire; exacting upwards of 1,000l. in fees and port dues[9] on each foreign vessel that enters Canton, the only harbour to which they are admitted,[10] imposing severe sea and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 541, Saturday, April 7, 1832 • Various
... Sure. I do think so, myself." Carl said it with a spurious society manner. In Gertie's aristocratic presence he desired to keep aloof from ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... conventionally, even coldly, aware of the sharp eyes and tongues round the table, but Harmony did not understand. She had expected moral support from his presence, and failing that she sank back into the loneliness and depression of the day. Her bright color faded; her eyes looked tragic and rather aloof. She ate almost nothing, and left the table before the ...
— The Street of Seven Stars • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... for some reason or other, hold aloof from me on these lecture tours. They stand at a distance and eye me, and I see wonder on their faces rather ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok (1863-1930)
... fashion set by Sir J. E. Millais when he sold such pictures as "Cherry Ripe" and "Bubbles," knowing they were intended for reproduction in very large numbers by mechanical means. From a somewhat similar motive a few of the leading artists of the nineteenth century for a time stood aloof from the movement for familiarising the people with at least the form, if not the colouring, of each notable picture of the year. From small and very unpretentious beginnings, the published pictorial notes of the Royal Academy and other exhibitions ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... were made with Germany's allies in the Triplice, Austria and Italy. Treaties with Switzerland and Belgium, Servia and Rumania, followed. Russia held aloof for a time, but as a great grain-exporting country she too found it advisable to come to terms. With France there was no need of an agreement, since she was bound by the Treaty of Frankfurt, concluded after the ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... any striking appeal to my dulled intelligence at that time. These were: the aloof attitude of Dr. Stacey, who seemed carefully to avoid me; and a curious circumstance which the second officer mentioned in conversation one evening as we strolled up and down the main ...
— The Devil Doctor • Sax Rohmer
... course, a certain unity of action with the constitutionalists, from whom, as I have said, the revolutionists of the old school had stood sternly aloof. There was now no question of a formal union, and certainly no idea of a "union of hearts," because the Socialists knew that their ultimate aim would be strenuously opposed by the Liberals, and the Liberals knew that an attempt was being made to use them as a cat's-paw; but there seemed to be no ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... bewitchment, of endearment. She became a bewildering revelation to him, amazing him, delighting him. After he had begun to conclude that he knew her she became not one woman, but a score of women: demure, elfin, pensive, childlike, sedate, aloof, laughing—but always with her delight in him unconcealed: the mask she wore always slipping from its place to reveal her eagerness to draw closer to him, ...
— Children of the Desert • Louis Dodge
... exasperation, must have been very blind. Those, on the other hand, who attempt to throw the responsibility of the disorders on Bailly, would prove by this alone, that good people should always keep aloof from ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago
... that the bearers of the noblest names in the land flocked at first to the offices of Messrs. Gray and Graham. In fact the reverse, in the beginning, was the case. Members even of the more learned professions held aloof: indeed barristers and physicians never became eager clients. On the other hand, Messrs. Gray and Graham received many letters in such handwritings, such grammar, and such orthography, that they burned them without replying. A common sort of case was that of the young farmer whose widowed mother ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... those days ended; hungered then at last Among wild beasts. They at his sight grew mild, 310 Nor sleeping him nor waking harmed; his walk The fiery serpent fled and noxious worm; The lion and fierce tiger glared aloof. But now an aged man in rural weeds, Following, as seemed, the quest of some stray eye, Or withered sticks to gather, which might serve Against a winter's day, when winds blow keen, To warm him wet returned from ...
— Paradise Regained • John Milton
... wasted. I acknowledged how entirely different a thing is the cultivation of plants, to one who has watched them and studied them in all the stages of their own free development, from what it is to one who has always stood aloof from Nature. ...
— Autobiography of Friedrich Froebel • Friedrich Froebel
... well-defined ill-will. But having been convicted, he finds himself shunned by all but criminal society, and together with other influences, educational in character, he is frequently allured into a relapse. If a prisoner endeavours to behave himself in gaol and keep aloof from evil contagion, he is bullied by his fellow-prisoners, and even his keepers regard him with suspicion. The one twit him with being a white-livered coward, the other consider him to be either a sneak or a "deep fellow." He is almost sure to fall and identify himself with the ranks of crime. ...
— A Plea for the Criminal • James Leslie Allan Kayll
... one of two things—either my proposal had been communicated to him, and he did not intend to accede to it; or neither Hurliguerly nor Arkins had spoken to him since the previous day. In the latter case, if he held aloof from me, it was because of his morose nature; it was because he did not choose to enter ...
— An Antarctic Mystery • Jules Verne
... self-control, obedience and loyalty to the sovereign—all the civic virtues; it was a moral code without a metaphysical background; the popular worships were tolerated, reverence for ancestors conduced to edification; the gods were to be honoured, though it was well to keep aloof from them; he disliked religious fervour, and of things beyond experience ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... held aloof, saying that they had come to see their English brothers fight, but, animated no doubt with the idea that, if they abstained from taking part in the fray, and the day went against the English, their friends the Iroquois would not ...
— With Wolfe in Canada - The Winning of a Continent • G. A. Henty
... only recently come to the Mills. He had at first impressed the neighborhood somewhat unfavorably, for he encouraged a suggestion of mystery, lived at the Inn, kept aloof from everyone, and seemed to have no family. Moira's own quick thought of him when Dale had pointed him out on the road in front of the Mill store was that "he looked too white for a working man." But he seemed to have singled Dale ...
— Red-Robin • Jane Abbott
... he—cared for—was interested in—that woman, the major's wife! Not that she ought to care one way or another, except that it was so despicable—so unlike him. Yet she had promised herself—had virtually promised her father—that she would hold far aloof from this man, and here he stood, so close that their heart-beats almost intermingled, and he was telling her that he wished she had kept and never returned the little butterfly net, for now, when it had won a value it never before had known, it was his fate to lose it. "And now," he said, ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... was warm-hearted and enthusiastic, but though gentle in her manners, she seemed more inclined to resent an injury than to forgive it. Still she was very different to her father, for whom Edda had conceived a great dislike. No one, indeed, liked him. Her father kept studiously aloof from his society, and even Father Mendez rarely or never spoke to him. Edda's chief annoyance arose from the attentions paid her by Alfonse Gerardin; they had become more frequent, and he was far more confident in his manner than he had ever before been. How to treat him ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... are there? There's a bigger demand for smoked glasses to look at eclipses of the sun. Why should Fame come to me? Haven't I given up my days for her? That is enough to keep her away. I am a poet; that is enough reason for her to slight me. Proud and aloof and cold as marble, what does Fame care for us? Yes, Dick is right. It's a poor game chasing illusions, hunting the intangible, pursuing dreams. Dreams? Why, ...
— Plays of Near & Far • Lord Dunsany
... philosophic reflections. The situation conveys the general impression of a peevish little stream breaking against great calm cliffs. All this frantic excitement and expenditure of energy is so apparently purposeless and futile, the calm cattle seem so aloof and superior to it all, so absolutely unaffected by it. They are going slowly, to be sure; their gait may be maddeningly deliberate, but evidently they do not intend to be hurried. Why not let them take their ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... was a malady the very consciousness of which was an allurement, rather than a pain, and in which Death appeared but as a voluptuous vanishing into space. I had given myself up to the charm, and had determined to keep aloof from society, which might have dissipated it, and in the midst of the world to wrap myself in silence, solitude, and reserve. I used my isolation of mind as a shroud to shut out the sight of men, so as to contemplate ...
— Raphael - Pages Of The Book Of Life At Twenty • Alphonse de Lamartine
... was as aloof and taciturn a client as Rammer Spacelines ever had picked up. A lean, blond character of indeterminate age, with pale eyes, hard mouth. Why he had selected a bulky semifreighter like the Queen for a mineralogical survey jaunt to a lifeless ...
— The Winds of Time • James H. Schmitz
... by I have given time to the vineyard, but nothing at all of myself. I held myself aloof and apart while Duty, like a stern taskmaster, urged me to the things I hated, merely to please Mother, who had done so much for me that she had the right to ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed
... and all the people about were preparing to shoot the covers, so that parties had to be made up and invitations issued, and there soon came to be a general stir throughout the countryside. Captain Frank, though he was not much of a shot, took his share in all these things; but he held aloof from womankind, and would not have his marriage even spoken of by his most ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... afternoon the game waxed joyfully. For a long time, Margery sat aloof, playing with the baby. But when the excavating of the cave began, she succumbed, and began to grovel in the sand with the other two. She was allowed to come in as Friday's father, and baby Patience, panting at her work of scratching the sand with a crooked stick, was entered ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... naturally held aloof from the unlawful magnificence at Tuebingen, and her Ladyship of Urach realised that she must form a circle of her own, so she summoned her ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... the Conservative journal goes to Evje (whose schoolmate and friend he has been) and tries to persuade him to break the alliance with Rein. Evje, who prides himself on his "moderation" and tolerance, and his purpose to keep aloof from partisanship, refuses to be bullied; whereupon the editor threatens him with social ostracism and commercial ruin. The distiller, who is at heart a coward, is completely unnerved by this threat. Well knowing how a paper can undermine ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... Pisa, even from Milan, (the dominion of the Visconti,) from Genoa, from Naples,—came Ambassadors to welcome his return, or to thank him for having freed Italy from the freebooter De Montreal. Venice alone, who held in her pay the Grand Company, stood aloof. Never had Rienzi seemed more prosperous and more powerful, and never had he exhibited a more easy and cheerful majesty ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... house-serfs—at best, a person of the working class. Pasinkov was extremely courteous and gentle to everybody, though he never sought the society of any one. If he were rudely treated, he was neither humiliated nor sullen; he simply withdrew and held himself aloof, with a sort of regretful look, as it were biding his time. This was just how he behaved with me. About two months passed. One bright summer day I happened to go out of the playground after a noisy game of leap-frog, and walking into the garden ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... this attitude of yours is merely passive, sullen, negative, as it mainly is, despairing of our capacity and anticipating a future of gloom, it is no game for man or woman. It is certainly the opposite of that for which I plead. Do not stand aloof, despising, disbelieving, but come in and help—insist on coming in and helping. After all, we have shown a good deal of courage; and your part is to add a greater courage to it. There are glorious years lying ahead of you if you choose to ...
— Courage • J. M. Barrie
... himself, of which Lord Palmerston, however, must be the chief member. Lord Palmerston would not like to serve under Lord John Russell—would be ready to form an Administration, which could not have duration, however, in his opinion, if Lord John Russell held aloof! ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... rushing rivers, and high mountains, the scene for unknown ages of the hard perpetual struggle of savage man with nature, and of the fierce conflict of man with man. At first the interior tribes remained aloof, and the little outpost of civilisation was frequently threatened by them with extermination. But after some few years the Kayans of the lower villages became reconciled to the new state of affairs, recognised the authority of the Rajah and of the Resident, and consented ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... could be heard. The sharp, crisp clack of Joe's footsteps had been swallowed up by the distance. She could hear the sound of her own breathing. An uneasiness came gradually upon her, a vague sort of dread of being left alone, entirely alone. How aloof he had seemed; how aloof everything seemed, and unreal! Those sinister trees waving there without a breath of wind; the lowering shadows of the summerhouse and the barn; that greasy moonlight that came ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... had been her bravest defenders now rose against her; and she would probably have perished had the whole Italian people taken part in the war. But the insurrection was confined almost exclusively to the Sabellians and their kindred races. The Etruscans and Umbrians stood aloof, while the Sabines, Volscians, and other tribes who already possessed the Roman franchise, supported the Republic, and furnished the materials of her armies. The nations which composed the formidable ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... di Nottinero was not exactly a Recamier, but she was a remarkably brilliant woman, and the acknowledged leader of the liberal part of Florentine society. Of course, the haughty aristocratic party held themselves grandly aloof, and knew nothing either of her or the society to ...
— The Dodge Club - or, Italy in 1859 • James De Mille
... understand Genevan ways. It is because she is so clever that no young man falls in love with her. Those who might be attracted by her personal charms hold themselves aloof on account of her intellectual capacities, as they would have to ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... they were when they died, but in the heyday of youth and strength. He called to his mother, but she ran away trembling. He clasped his father by the hand, and said: "Father! don't you know me? can't you see me? I am your son." But his father fell yelling to the ground. So he stood aloof again, and watched how his parents and the other people in the house set up the divine symbols, and prayed in order to make the evil ...
— Aino Folk-Tales • Basil Hall Chamberlain
... was summer, and all the prairie extending over illimitable stretches till it was lost in the tranquil horizon, was burning with the blooms of a hundred varieties of flowers. Here the "tiger rose," like some savage queen of beauty, rose to his knees and breathed her sultry balm in his face. Aloof stood the shy wild rose, shedding its scent with delicate reserve; but the wild pea, and the convolvulus, and the augur flower, and the insipid daisy, ran riot through all the grass land, and surfeited his nostrils with their sweets. ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... the other, and to involve England in embarrassing questions. The attempt of the German democracies, triumphant in 1848, to fuse the powers of Germany into a whole, a new Germanic empire, also involved questions of great intricacy, and which, however England might desire to keep aloof, tended to affect treaties in which she was concerned. The union of all Germany as one authority would introduce a new element into European relations, disturbing the balance of power. Russia and France had much to apprehend from such a union; England but little, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... cafe, which during the whole time the Empire lasted was also frequented by Protestants without a single dispute caused by the difference of religion ever arising. But from this time forth the Catholics began to hold themselves aloof from the Protestants; the latter perceiving this, gave up the cafe by degrees to the Catholics, being determined to keep the peace whatever it might cost, and went to a cafe which had been just opened under the sign of ...
— Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... moaning in the wrath Of winds that blew aloof; The weeds were in the gravel path, The owl was on ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce
... represented in our large manufacturing towns, can know how lamentable that failure is. We gather in the rich and the poor, but the great middle class that makes the staple and the strength of American society stands aloof. ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington
... the mind to make itself known, it is not at once make known to another; but some sensible sign must be used. Gregory alludes to this fact when he says (Moral. ii): "To other eyes we seem to stand aloof as it were behind the wall of the body; and when we wish to make ourselves known, we go out as it were by the door of the tongue to show what we really are." But an angel is under no such obstacle, and so he can make his concept ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas |
