"Daemon" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the initiated young men of Crete or elsewhere danced at night over the mountains in the Oreibasia or Mountain Walk they not only did things that seemed beyond their ordinary workaday strength; they also felt themselves led on and on by some power which guided and sustained them. This daemon has no necessary name: a man may be named after him 'Oreibasius', 'Belonging to the Mountain Dancer', just as others may be named 'Apollonius' or 'Dionysius'. The god is only the spirit of the Mountain Dance, Oreibates, ...
— Five Stages of Greek Religion • Gilbert Murray
... vain. They directed him rightly; and when, in old age, he had gathered around him at Vallencay all that remained of the wit, genius, and talent of French society in its better forms, he delighted to recount the instances in which this supernatural influence, like Socrates' daemon, had befriended him. He believed in the reality of this power when he believed in nothing else, and that ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... occurred to him with anguish. The countenance of Edith, haughty and mournful last night, rose to him again. He saw her canvassing for her father, and against him. Madness! And for what was he to make this terrible and costly sacrifice For his ambition? Not even for that Divinity or Daemon for which we all immolate so much! Mighty ambition, forsooth, to succeed to the Rigbys! To enter the House of Commons a slave and a tool; to move according to instructions, and to labour for the low designs of petty spirits, without even the consolation of being a dupe. What sympathy ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... be explained. The ancients realized their consciousness in the national God. Modern nationalities, more complicated and less artistic, are more difficult to decipher. What one seeks for in them is the daemon, the fatum, the inner genius, the mission, the primitive disposition, both what there is desire for and what there is power for, the force in them ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... that which is able to conduct a man? One thing, and only one, philosophy.[33] But this consists in keeping the daemon within a man free from violence and unharmed, superior to pains and pleasures, doing nothing without a purpose, nor yet falsely and with hypocrisy,... and besides accepting all that happens, and all that is allotted, as coming from thence, wherever ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... committed some great offence against laws human or divine, he was said to be possessed of a daemon—that is to say, he became the medium and instrument through, and by which, the evil was wrought; thus, when in due season he came to be hanged, tortured, or burned, it was inflicted not so much as a punishment upon him, the man, as to exorcise, once and for all, ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... with by art-critics who know the body well enough of music, but nothing of the living creature within. The world is full of these vulgar souls that palter with eternal Nature and the eternal Arts, blind to the Word who dwells among us therein. Tom, or the daemon in Tom, was not one ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various
... other, in banter, replied, "Do walls then make Christians?" And this he often said, that he was already a Christian; and Simplicianus as often made the same answer, and the conceit of the "walls" was by the other as often renewed. For he feared to offend his friends, proud daemon-worshippers, from the height of whose Babylonian dignity, as from cedars of Libanus, which the Lord had not yet broken down, he supposed the weight of enmity would fall upon him. But after that by reading and earnest thought he had gathered ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... permitted to roam upon earth, to torment the bodies and to seduce the minds of sinful men. It was confessed, or at least it was imagined, that they had distributed among themselves the most important characters of Polytheism, one daemon assuming the name of Jupiter, another of AEsculapius, a third of Venus, and ...
— Folklore as an Historical Science • George Laurence Gomme
... come to a curious thing. We have seen how a spirit, a daemon, and perhaps ultimately a god, develops out of an actual rite. Dionysos the Tree-God, the Spirit of Vegetation, is but a maypole once perceived, then remembered and conceived. Dionysos, the Bull-God, is but the actual holy ...
— Ancient Art and Ritual • Jane Ellen Harrison
... Socrates and Plato. How could he reconcile the idea of that absolute and eternal one Being, that Zeus, Father of Gods and men, self-perfect, self-contained, without change or motion, in whom, as a Jew, he believed even more firmly than the Platonists, with the Daemon of Socrates, the Divine Teacher whom both Plato and Solomon confessed? Or how, again, could he reconcile the idea of Him with the creative and providential energy, working in space and time, working on matter, and apparently ...
— Alexandria and her Schools • Charles Kingsley
... of the temples would manifest themselves of their grace. Every man had a guardian spirit, a "genius"; and by proper means he could be "compelled" to show himself visibly. The pupils of Plotinus conjured up his "genius", and it came—not a daemon, but a god. The right formula ("mantram") and the right stone in the hand—and a man had a wonderful power over the gods themselves. This ...
— The Jesus of History • T. R. Glover
... no doubt, resolved that misfortune, as personified by nurse, should not hurt him. The misfortune, alas! proved stronger than the daemon, and misfortune, he found ...
— The Angel and the Author - and Others • Jerome K. Jerome
... by-word as the strange creation of a poetical imagination. A mixture of gnome and savage, half daemon, half brute, in his behaviour we perceive at once the traces of his native disposition, and the influence of Prospero's education. The latter could only unfold his understanding, without, in the slightest degree, ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... against the devil: or rather this mighty deed in him was the Saviour's, who condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the Lord should be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. But neither did Antony, because the daemon had fallen, grow careless and despise him; neither did the enemy, when worsted by him, cease from lying in ambush against him. For he came round again as a lion, seeking a pretence against him. But Antony had learnt from Scripture that many are the devices ...
— The Hermits • Charles Kingsley
... should an actor found a college? The devil was in it somewhere. Tradition told "that Mr. Alleyne, being a Tragedian, and one of the Original Actors in many of the celebrated Shakespear's Plays, in one of which he play'd a Daemon, with six others, and was in the midst of the Play surpriz'd by an Apparition of the Devil, which so worked on his Fancy, that he made a Vow which he perform'd at this Place." That was the beginning of Dulwich College, according to one story; according to ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... him thus bespake. Elpenor! how cam'st thou into the realms Of darkness? Hast thou, though on foot, so far Outstripp'd my speed, who in my bark arrived? So I, to whom with tears he thus replied. Laertes' noble son, for wiles renown'd! Fool'd by some daemon and the intemp'rate bowl, I perish'd in the house of Circe; there 70 The deep-descending steps heedless I miss'd, And fell precipitated from the roof. With neck-bone broken from the vertebrae Outstretch'd I lay; my spirit sought the shades. But now, by those whom thou hast ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... praeterita nostri. Imparibus restat danda secunda modis. Quam si praestiterit mentem Daemon malus addam, Cum sapiens ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... distant parts of the shop, I said to Probus, who seemed heavily oppressed by what had occurred, 'What daemon dwells in that body that ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware
... difficulty that does not demand immediate solution if we are to find peace. Some men of very strong and thoughtful character are conscious of a sort of second self within themselves, to which they appeal in trouble as Socrates to his Daemon; but most men, in trouble and alone, would turn to a friend if there were ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... think I would profane the aura of her by my abhorred presence?" cried the lover. "Ah, God of Love, I would die sooner! I feel, indeed, my Daemon at work. Let me sit upon this bench—my tablets, ha!" He sat. Finely disordered verse, rime sciolte, resulted; but Ippolita was ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... if somebody was approaching, and looking towards the door, perceived it open. A gigantic figure of frightful aspect stood before him, and continued to gaze upon him with silent severity. 23. Brutus is reported to have asked, "Art thou a daemon or a mortal? and why comest thou to me?" "Brutus," answered the phantom, "I am thy evil genius—thou shalt see me again at Philippi."[9] "Well, then," replied Brutus, without being discomposed, "we ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... almost instantly deserted. The fate of the wall which Probus erected may confirm the general observation. Within a few years after his death, it was overthrown by the Alemanni. Its scattered ruins, universally ascribed to the power of the Daemon, now serve only to excite the wonder of ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... dire spirit, applied to a malignant daemon who sold the most inveterate poisons. These he presented, like a cup of pure iced water, to his friend, and to his own affectionate father. They drank the draught, and soon began to pine. He marked the progress of their dissolution with a horrid firmness. He let the moment ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... expense of attributing to actual consciousness a substantial independence and a directive physical force which were incongruous with it: a force and independence perfectly congruous with the Platonic soul, which had been a mythological being, a supernatural spirit or daemon or incubus, incarnate in the natural world, and partly dominating it. The relations of such a soul to the particular body or bodies which it might weave for itself on earth, to the actions which it performed through such ...
— Some Turns of Thought in Modern Philosophy - Five Essays • George Santayana
... Taurinum filiolum suum jam quadragenarium, Praesulem ordinavit; et (vaticinatis pluribus quae passurus erat) Ebroicensibus in nomine Domini direxit. Viro Dei ad portas civitatis appropinquanti, daemon in tribus figmentis se opposuit: scilicet in specie ursi, et leonis, et bubali terrere athletam Christi voluit. Sed ille fortiter, ut inexpugnabilis murus, in fide perstitit, et coeptum iter peregit, hospitiumque in domo Lucii suscepit. ...
— Account of a Tour in Normandy, Vol. II. (of 2) • Dawson Turner
... demons know scientific truths: because sciences are about things necessary and invariable, and such things are subject to human knowledge, and much more to the knowledge of demons, who are of keener intellect, as Augustine says [*Gen. ad lit. ii, 17; De Divin. Daemon. 3, 4]. Therefore it seems to be no sin to practice the magic art, even though it achieve its result through ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... this comparatively small sum. Again, he was not restrained from a contemplation of suicide by any scruples of religion—for he has left his views expressed in an article written some few days before his death. He believed in a daemon or conscience which prompted every man to follow good and avoid evil; but—different men different daemons—his held self-slaughter justified when life became intolerable; with him therefore it would be no crime. Wilson suggests ...
— The Rowley Poems • Thomas Chatterton
... a swift, uncertain shuffle, a compromise between a saunter and a dog-trot. The arms hung straight and stiff from the narrow shoulders, like the radii of a governor, diverging more or less according to the rate of speed. When the scourge of his Daemon lashed him along furiously, they stood fast at forty-five degrees. His eyes peered suspiciously around, as he lumbered on, watchful for the avenger of fat, who, perhaps, was even now at his heels. A slouch-hat, crowning hollow ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... I did well,' replied Marcus, 'to leave it on your finger during your sickness. I looked at it and saw that it was a Christian seal. Had it been one of those which are yet seen too often, with the stamp of a daemon, I should have plucked it off, and perhaps have destroyed it. The ring of a blessed martyr I Let us seek, let us seek! But, brother Basil,' he added gravely, 'has there passed through your heart no evil thought? I like not this falling of ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing
... mistaken. A flash of lightning illuminated the object, and discovered its shape plainly to me; its gigantic stature, and the deformity of its aspect more hideous than belongs to humanity, instantly informed me that it was the wretch, the filthy daemon, to whom I had given life. What did he there? Could he be (I shuddered at the conception) the murderer of my brother? No sooner did that idea cross my imagination, than I became convinced of its truth; my teeth chattered, and I was forced ...
— Frankenstein - or The Modern Prometheus • Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley
... are to understand that the Attendant Spirit has halloed just before entering; this is shown by the stage-direction given in the edition of Comus printed by Lawes in 1637: He hallos; the Guardian Daemon hallos again, and enters in the habit ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton
... formes being fetcht From glist'ring semblances of piety: But he that temper'd thee, bad thee stand vp, Gaue thee no instance why thou shouldst do treason, Vnlesse to dub thee with the name of Traitor. If that same Daemon that hath gull'd thee thus, Should with his Lyon-gate walke the whole world, He might returne to vastie Tartar backe, And tell the Legions, I can neuer win A soule so easie as that Englishmans. Oh, how hast thou with iealousie infected The sweetnesse of affiance? ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... a philosophical value for popular superstition. It was a common notion of the pagans as well as the Jews of the time that an intermediate order of beings passed between heaven and earth and brought supernatural aid to men; and also that a familiar spirit, or Daemon, dwelt within the soul of each man. The finer spirit of Philo resolves the attendant Daemon and the messenger-daemons or angels into the spiritual effluences of the one Deity; save for a few places where he ...
— Philo-Judaeus of Alexandria • Norman Bentwich
... Pompilius, came to him invisible to all Eyes else, and gave him all his Wisdom and Philosophy. Zoroaster, Trismegistus, Apuleius, Aquinius, Albertus Magnus, Socrates and Virgil had their Zilphid, which the Foolish call'd their Daemon or Devil. But you ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. III • Aphra Behn
... suppressed excitement the sanest man sometimes finds himself bereft of the power of choosing his line of action; the directing will seems to lie outside of him. It is not strange that a Greek, not being a psychologist, should say that a Fate was driving him to his destiny, or that his Daemon had taken the helm and was directing affairs as ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... whole universe, tend to paint a far more delicate copy of their essence in his mind. Like the metamorphosis of things into higher organic forms is their change into melodies. Over everything stands its daemon or soul, and, as the form of the thing is reflected by the eye, so the soul of the thing is reflected by a melody. The sea, the mountain-ridge, Niagara, and every flower-bed, pre-exist, or super-exist, in pre-cantations, ...
— Essays, Second Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... silver forks. Iron forks were used in the kitchen, as is shown in the inventory of Zerubbabel Endicott in 1683. And three-tined iron forks were stuck into poor witch-ridden souls in Salem by William Morse—his Daemon. ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... countenance; and doctors can tell some passions of the soul by the mere pulse. Much more then can angels, or even demons, the more deeply they penetrate those occult bodily modifications. Hence Augustine says (De divin. daemon.) that demons "sometimes with the greatest faculty learn man's dispositions, not only when expressed by speech, but even when conceived in thought, when the soul expresses them by certain signs ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... questions and definitions His contempt of theories Imperfection of contemporaneous physical science The Ionian philosophers Socrates bases truth on consciousness Uncertainty of physical inquiries in his day Superiority of moral truth Happiness, Virtue, Knowledge,—the Socratic trinity The "daemon" of Socrates His idea of God and Immortality Socrates a witness and agent of God Socrates compared with Buddha and Marcus Aurelius His resemblance to Christ in life and teachings Unjust charges of his enemies His ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord
... not attend his Instructions) how to make a Magical Glass which should represent any Person or thing according as he should desire. If a Magician by an Inchanted Glass can do this, he may as well by the help of a Daemon cause false Idaeas of Persons and Things to be impressed on the Imaginations of bewitched Persons; the Blood and Spirits of a Man, that is bitten with a Mad-Dog, are so envenomed, as that strange Impressions are thereby ...
— The Wonders of the Invisible World • Cotton Mather
... crowing of the cock. Then, as if secure in the Lord, she said to the bystanders, "What should we do if the fiend showed himself to us?" And shortly afterwards, with a loud and clear voice, "Fly! fly!" as if repelling the daemon.' ...
— The Saint's Tragedy • Charles Kingsley
... statues of a similar description to the three already mentioned. From the indistinct character of all of them, it would appear that Antinous was nowhere identified with any one of the great Egyptian deities, but was treated as a Daemon powerful to punish and protect. This designation corresponds to the contemptuous rebuke addressed by Origen to Celsus, where he argues that the new saint was only a malignant and vengeful spirit. His Egyptian medals are few and of questionable ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... of September the 14th, that 'the human understanding is a revelation from its maker,' gives the best solution that I believe can be given of the question, 'What did Socrates mean by his Daemon?' He was too wise to believe, and too honest to pretend, that he had real and familiar converse with a superior and invisible being. He probably considered the suggestions of his conscience, or reason, as revelations, or inspirations from the Supreme mind, bestowed, on important ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... predilection, or necessity of your lives, to resolve upon this one thing at least, that you will enable yourselves daily to do actually with your hands, something that is useful to mankind. To do anything well with your hands, useful or not; to be, even in trifling, [Greek: palamesi daemon], is already much. When we come to examine the art of the Middle Ages, I shall be able to show you that the strongest of all influences of right then brought to bear upon character was the necessity for exquisite manual ...
— Aratra Pentelici, Seven Lectures on the Elements of Sculpture - Given before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... particularly affected by them. It was easy to perceive that most of his meditations were tinctured from this source. To this was to be ascribed a design in which his pen was, at this period, engaged, of collecting and investigating the facts which relate to that mysterious personage, the Daemon of Socrates. ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... from the current notions of the Greeks, and Romans; and more especially from the descriptions of their poets. Polytheism, originally vile, and unwarrantable, was rendered ten times more base by coming through their hands. To instance in one particular: among all the daemon herd what one is there of a form, and character, so odious, and contemptible as Priapus? an obscure ill-formed Deity, who was ridiculed and dishonoured by his very votaries. His hideous figure was ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant
... strength, Fell heavy on him, plung'd him in the sea, And, with the stern, the rudder tore away. Headlong he fell, and, struggling in the main, Cried out for helping hands, but cried in vain. The victor daemon mounts obscure in air, While the ship sails without the pilot's care. On Neptune's faith the floating fleet relies; But what the man forsook, the god supplies, And o'er the dang'rous deep secure the navy flies; Glides by the Sirens' cliffs, a shelfy coast, ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil |
