"Flatterer" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... from place to place. To be an earl he did aspire, And reason good for such desire; But worth in these ungrateful times, To envied honor seldom climbs. Vain mortals! give your wishes o'er, And trust the flatterer Hope no more, Whose promises, whate'er they seem, End in a ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... back. Brutus hath rived my heart: A friend should bear his friend's infirmities, But Brutus makes mine greater than they are. Bru. I do not, till you practice them on me. Cas. You love me not. Bru. I do not like your faults. Cas. A friendly eye could never see such faults. Bru. A flatterer's would not, though they do appear As huge as high Olympus. Cas. Come, Antony, and young Octavius, come, Revenge yourselves alone on Cassius, For Cassius is aweary of the world; Hated by one he loves; braved by his brother; Checked like a bondman; all his faults observed, ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... any one else, never esteemed as the best judge, of either play, or player. But money may purchase, and interest procure, a patent, though they cannot purchase taste, or parts, the person proposed was, possibly, some favoured flatterer, the partner of his private pleasures, or humble admirer of his table talk: These little monarchs have their little courtiers. Mr. Thomson insisted on my keeping the part. He said, 'Twas his opinion, none but myself, or Mr. Quin, could do it any justice; and, as that excellent actor could not be ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... miseries abound, A thousand ways to waste superfluous wealth, Without one fool or flatterer at your board, Without one hour of sickness or ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... you are? I shall go to Bologna by Ferrara, instead of Mantua: because I would rather see the cell where they caged Tasso, and where he became mad and * *, than his own MSS. at Modena, or the Mantuan birthplace of that harmonious plagiary and miserable flatterer, whose cursed hexameters were drilled into me at Harrow. I saw Verona and Vicenza on ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. IV - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... "Flatterer!" said Mr. Montfort. "Does this come of visiting Mrs. Peyton? She used to be an adept in the art. But what do our two other Margarets say? Has Peggy set the prairies on fire yet? She will some day, ...
— Margaret Montfort • Laura E. Richards
... "Ah! flatterer, flatterer! Ye have all the guile of the tongue our enemies give Clan Campbell credit for, and that I wish I had a little more of. Still and on, it's no time for fair words. Look! Elrigmore. You'll ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... a little arch-flatterer," I said; "and the Basin, out of its goodness of heart, has made me vain, that is all. It won't do. I need to sweep some more floors and peel some more potatoes." She would not smile; she shook her puzzled head at ...
— Vesty of the Basins • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... offer, and from that moment the best understanding existed between the parties. The privateersman, who had received a much better education than he pretended to, and who was a consummate actor as well as, on certain occasions, a practised flatterer, determined to be more cautious in future, sparing his literary conjectures, whatever liberties he might take with other subjects. And yet this reckless and daring mariner never flattered nor deceived Ghita in anything! With her he had been all sincerity, the influence ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... "Ah, Dolores, you flatterer! Seriously, though, don't you realize that we are Americans, and people of position? An injury to us would bring terrible consequences upon General Longorio's head. That is why he ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... know there is no king present, and that proves I am no flatterer. I speak of my love and admiration to my king, but not to his face. I praise and exalt him behind his back; that shows that I love him dearly, not for honor or favor, but out of a pure ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... and turned the conversation into another channel. But the words haunted her, "I would give my fortune to be Algernon." Could he be in earnest? Perhaps it was only a passing compliment—men were fond of paying such. But the Squire was no flatterer; he seldom said what he did not mean. She re-read Algernon's letter, and thought no more about the words that ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie
... terms of praise and affected reverence, do you believe they would have hailed his name with cheers, or have heard it with anything of respect?" And again; "We degrade our own honour and the sovereign's by unduly and unjustly praising him; and the mere slaverer and flatterer is one who comes forward, as it were, with flash notes, and pays with false coin his tribute to Caesar. I don't disguise that I feel somehow on my trial here for loyalty,—for honest English feeling." This was said by Thackeray at a ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope
... because it would be no news," laughed Edward, gazing with fondness and admiration at the blooming face of the loved flatterer. ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... d'Estaing, and others—all men of honor.' How far-sighted was my father, in recommending these men! They are the very nobles who have kept aloof from the late king's mistresses. With one exception, I adopt the list; but there is one among them, who stooped to be a flatterer of Du Barry. The Duke d'Aiguillon is certainly a statesman, but he cannot be of ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... "Flatterer!" she said, with affected severity, but the delicate pink flush that bloomed in her cheeks showed that ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed
... be a lonely sort of siren play, but it is true to life and should prove a lesson. The men were flattering the dude, and flattery is always based on design and a selfish motive. Beware of the flatterer in the first place. Eschew gambling—if you are only playing for fun it costs as much as though you were playing to make money. It is demoralizing every time, and often leads to greater crime. Gambling is a very dangerous amusement. These men were working the dude, and ...
— Oscar the Detective - Or, Dudie Dunne, The Exquisite Detective • Harlan Page Halsey
... palace, rung With endless cries, and endless sons he sung. To bless good Sakil Laurus would be first; But Sakil's prince and Sakil's God he curst. Sakil without distinction threw his bread, Despised the flatterer, but the poet fed." I need not say that Sakil is Sackville, or that Laurus is a translation of the famous ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... "Hush, flatterer! not so loud, if you please. My father is taking an evening stroll, and is very quick of hearing. He has tied me up by my poor wings in the cavern, for he is mightily afraid of some beast running away with me. You know I have all ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... cannot blame thee, Who, am my selfe attach'd with wearinesse To th' dulling of my spirits: Sit downe, and rest: Euen here I will put off my hope, and keepe it No longer for my Flatterer: he is droun'd Whom thus we stray to finde, and the Sea mocks Our frustrate search on ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... said the precentor, shutting up the book and then opening it again as he saw the delightfully imploring look of his old friend Bunce. Oh, Bunce, Bunce, Bunce, I fear that after all thou art but a flatterer. "Well, I'll just finish it then; it's a favourite little bit of Bishop's; and then, Mr Bold, we'll have a stroll and a chat till Eleanor comes in and gives us tea." And so Bold sat down on the soft turf to listen, or rather to think how, after such sweet harmony, he ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope
... parasites, he had no notion of obeying, and a direct command or opposition roused his sullen temper of passive resistance. When he found 'that little nobody of a Mrs. John Dusautoy' so far from being a flatterer, or an adorer of his perfections, inclined to laugh at him, and bent on keeping him in order, all the enmity of which he was capable arose in his mind, and though in general good-natured and not aggressive, he had a decided pleasure ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Untrue as was this comparison, it strikingly exhibited the innate nobility of soul of the poor 'Northamptonshire Peasant.' Yet even this humility, the true sign of genius, was ill-construed by some of Clare's lukewarm patrons, who reproached him for being a flatterer when he only ...
— The Life of John Clare • Frederick Martin
... would not overwhelm the authors with the whole load of infamy, of which part, perhaps the greater part, ought to fall upon their patrons. If he that hires a bravo, partakes the guilt of murder, why should he who bribes a flatterer, hope to be exempted from the shame of falsehood? The unhappy dedicator is seldom without some motives which obstruct, though not destroy, the liberty of choice; he is oppressed by miseries which he hopes to relieve, or inflamed by ambition which he expects to ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... the noble profession of arms, yet I could admire Bonaparte's clever military plans and his shrewd remarks on the great captains of ancient and modern times. I could not refrain from saying, "General, you often reproach me for being no flatterer, but now I tell you plainly I admire you." And certainly, I really spoke the true sentiments ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... folk-etymology for necromantie, Greco-Lat. necromantia, divination by means of the dead. The popular form negromancie still survives in French. To curry favour is a corruption of Mid. Eng. "to curry favel." The expression is translated from French. Palsgrave has curryfavell, a flatterer, "estrille faveau," estriller (etriller) meaning "to curry (a horse)." Faveau, earlier fauvel, is the name of a horse in the famous Roman de Fauvel, a satirical Old French poem of the early 14th century. He symbolises ...
— The Romance of Words (4th ed.) • Ernest Weekley
... complimentary speech was shouted into old Martha's ear, and she responded by shaking her head and desiring the flatterer to "go along." ...
— The Story of the Rock • R.M. Ballantyne
... can go amiss in choosing from among the list of Chaminade's compositions I may mention as especially characteristic her "Arabesque," "Humoresque," La Lisonjera (Flatterer) "Pierrette," "Scaramouche" (Mountebank) ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb
... yours; Though last, not least in love, yours, good Trebonius. 190 Gentlemen all,—alas, what shall I say? My credit now stands on such slippery ground, That one of two bad ways you must conceit me, Either a coward or a flatterer. That I did love thee, Caesar, O, 'tis true: 195 If, then, thy spirit look upon us now, Shall it not grieve thee dearer than thy death, To see thy Antony making his peace, Shaking the bloody fingers of thy foes, Most noble! in the presence of thy corse? 200 Had ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare
... was a sanguinary parole, and the ministry an infernal administration: quoting the well-known observation of the philosopher Thaies; "that of all wild beasts, the worst was a tyrant, and of all tame ones, a flatterer." The motion was negatived, as was also a motion subsequently made by General Conway, for inspecting the powers vested in his majesty's commissioners ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... no flatterer, madam, and you have thought proper occasionally to express your approbation of ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... Spain under the reign of Philip the Third, Martin Fonseca would have risen early to high fortunes. But, as we have said, his talents were not those of the flatterer or the hypocrite; and it was a matter of astonishment to the calculators round him to see Don Martin Fonseca in the ante-room of Roderigo Calderon, Count Oliva, Marquis de Siete Iglesias, secretary to the King, and parasite and favourite of the ...
— Calderon The Courtier - A Tale • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... writings fear, And to yourself be critic most' severe; Fantastic wits their darling follies love, But find you faithful friends that will reprove, That on your works may look with careful eyes, And of your faults be zealous enemies. Lay by an author's pride and vanity, And from a friend a flatterer descry, Who seems to like, but means not what he says; Embrace true counsel, but ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... is perfectly well, and ready to dance at this minute with your reverence," says her father. "Or stay, Chaplain, perhaps you only dance on Sunday?" The Colonel then turned to Harry again. "You paid your court very neatly to the great lady, Mr. Flatterer. My Lady Yarmouth has been trumpeting your praises at the Pump Room. She says she has got a leedel boy in Hannover dat is wery like you, and you ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the window alight. O how my heart throbbed!—"Lie still," said I, "busy thing! why all this emotion?—Those shining ornaments cover not such a guileless flatterer as thou. Why ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... the toe of a rough shoe in the dust of the mountain roadside. Once more she saw a pair of eyes that won the heart with their honesty and seemed willing to have other eyes look through them into a soul concealing nothing. Though Jefferson Edwardes had been her first flatterer, he had flattered without ulterior motive. She was a ragged child and he a rich young man who might have to die. Suddenly she felt that the little girl who was once herself had been more admirable in every way than this polished woman who had succeeded ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... which loosest fastest tieth? Who makes a man live then glad when he dieth? To you! to you! all song of praise is due: Only of you the flatterer never lieth. ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... for saying so much on this subject; I have been unwillingly drawn into it; but I shall ever use a respectful frankness of communication with you. Your faithful friend, your devoted servant, I shall be to the end of my life: a flatterer you do not wish for. On this point of instructions, however, I think it scarcely possible we ever can have any sort of difference. Perhaps I may give you too much, rather than ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... a little History. Alison? No, certainly not Alison. 'They will be proposing Lingard next,' he murmurs, and the little irritation caused by the well-meant suggestion throws him back for the next six hours. Presently he tries Macaulay, whom some flatterer has fulsomely called 'as good as a novel,' but, though the trial of Warren Hastings gives him a fillip, the rout of Sedgemoor does away with the effect of it, and, happening upon the character ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... new regent humbly bowed. Wolves, bears, and mighty tigers bend, And strive who most shall condescend. 10 He straight assumes a solemn grace, Collects his wisdom in his face. The crowd admire his wit, his sense: Each word hath weight and consequence. The flatterer all his art displays: He who hath power, is sure of praise. A fox stept forth before the rest, And thus the servile throng address'd. 'How vast his talents, born to rule, And trained in virtue's honest school: 20 What clemency his temper sways! How ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... the wonderful stimulus and encouragement he could give to the young student. But he was no flatterer. No one could strike harder or swifter than he, ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... "Methinks I look so wretchedly to-day!" When most the world applauds you, most beware; 'Tis often less a blessing than a snare. Distrust mankind; with your own heart confer; And dread even there to find a flatterer. The breath of others raises our renown; Our own as surely blows the pageant down. Take up no more than you by worth can claim, Lest soon you prove a bankrupt in your fame. But own I must, in this perverted age, Who most deserve, can't always ...
— The Poetical Works of Edward Young, Volume 2 • Edward Young
... shy or reserved. cozened: cheated, beguiled. The origin of this word is interesting: a cozener is one who, for selfish ends, claims kindred or cousinship with another, and hence a flatterer or cheat. ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton
... they break, Yet act the flatterer's part; With fair deceitful lips they speak, And ...
— The Psalms of David - Imitated in the Language of The New Testament - And Applied to The Christian State and Worship • Isaac Watts
... "Flatterer!" he exclaimed, pressing her cheeks between his hands.... "Oh, I have it marked out already! In the dry lands of my country, I have seen a farmer, wanting to lead water to a perishing field, go digging along the ground, while the stream bubbled and leaped ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... he retained his post as gamekeeper, was regarded by Mr. Wilton as a somewhat shady character. Ermengarde fancied she liked Susy because of the little girl's remarkable beauty, but the real reason why her fancy was captivated was because Susy was an adroit flatterer. ...
— The Children of Wilton Chase • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... child; these are no thoughts to begin a work with. Little flatterer, it may be well for me that our lives must needs lie so far apart that I shall not oft ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... proofs of this. It may be covered a time, but not long. Naturam expellas furca licet, usque recurret.(403) All the world shall be witness of it, Psal. cxxv. So then, (ver 21.) the calumniator and false accuser, who openly professes his hatred and malice, and the flatterer that seems to be moved with love, both of them produce one effect, viz., ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... Mr. Solomon Jenks, a young gentleman who affected a charming frankness and abruptness in his speech, but who was in reality the most specious flatterer of the entire party. Mr. Jenks rejoiced in the following personal advantages: red hair, a blue nose, goggle eyes, and ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... stamped on this gold proclaims to the world the sovereignty of Nadir, native of the land of Persia, and the monarch who subdues the earth." On the reverse was a short Arabic sentence, which signified "That which has happened is the best." But even the flatterer who records these particulars confesses that there were malicious wits who made free with the latter sentence, and, by the alteration of the position of one letter, made it signify "That which has ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... "I'm no flatterer," said the miller; "never was, and you can't please everybody. If I said your daughter took after you I don't s'pose she'd ever speak ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... Palestrina loved music, as Bacon loved truth, as Kant loved philosophy,—satisfied with itself as its own reward. He disliked to be patronized, but always remembered benefits, and loved the tribute of respect and admiration, even as he scorned the empty flatterer of fashion. He was the soul of sincerity as well as of magnanimity; and hence had great capacity for friendship, as well as great power of self-sacrifice His friendship with Vittoria Colonna is as memorable ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VI • John Lord
... torment and tormentor with great perspicuity. This order of platonic ladies are to be dealt with in a peculiar manner from all the rest of the sex. Flattery is the general way, and the way in this case; but it is not to be done grossly. Every man that has wit, and humour, and raillery, can make a good flatterer for woman in general; but a Platonne is not to be touched with panegyric: she will tell you, it is a sensuality in the soul to be delighted that way. You are not therefore to commend, but silently consent to all she does, and says. You are to consider in her the scorn of you is ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... plausible lady at a dinner-table, she takes the earliest opportunity of expressing her belief that you are acquainted with the Clickits; she is sure she has heard the Clickits speak of you—she must not tell you in what terms, or you will take her for a flatterer. You admit a knowledge of the Clickits; the plausible lady immediately launches out in their praise. She quite loves the Clickits. Were there ever such true-hearted, hospitable, excellent people—such a gentle, ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... value to praise; but the unflinching truth of the speaker, that carried his words so directly to the heart of the listener. This is one of the great advantages of plain dealing and frankness. The habitual and wily flatterer may succeed until his practices recoil on himself, and like other sweets his aliment cloys by its excess; but he who deals honestly, though he often necessarily offends, possesses a power of praising that no quality but sincerity can bestow, since his words go directly to the ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... best and truest servant that ever prince had the good fortune to possess, and continued through life to merit that honourable character. The friends were indeed made for each other. William wanted neither a guide nor a flatterer. Having a firm and just reliance on his own judgment, he was not partial to counsellors who dealt much in suggestions and objections. At the same time he had too much discernment, and too much elevation of mind, to be gratified by sycophancy. The confidant of such ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Tickels, drawing nearer to her, and eagerly surveying the exposed charms of her splendid person—"offer no apology for feasting my eyes on beauty such as yours. I am no fulsome flatterer when I declare to you, that you are the queen and star of all the beautiful women it has ever been my lot to behold! You are not offended ...
— Venus in Boston; - A Romance of City Life • George Thompson
... graceful tribute to, the "serene and silent art" of painting; and the very noble epistle addressed to Congreve, which reminds you of one giant hand of genius held out to welcome and embrace another. Gross flatterer as Dryden often was, there is something in this epistle that rings true, and the emotion in it you feel even all his powers could never have enabled him to counterfeit. Such generous patronage of rising, by acknowledged ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... gayly, "I have known Mr. Keith a long time, and I give you one standing piece of advice. Don't believe one word that he tells you; for he is the most insidious flatterer that lives." ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... the Florentines, who have beautified and adorned not only their own city but also very many others, with great glory and no small profit to themselves and to their country. And, seeing that the fear of being held a flatterer should not prevent me from testifying to the truth, though this will turn to the highest fame and honor of my lords and patrons, I say that all Italy, nay the whole world, owes it solely to the judgment and the generosity ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... as I was impressed instead of lolling there like a surfeited python. I tell you, old Sabre was all pink under his skin, and his eyes shining, and his voice tingling. I tell you, if you were a real painter instead of a base flatterer of bloated and wealthy sitters, and if you'd seen him then, you'd have painted the masterpiece of your age and called it The Visionary. I tell you, old Sabre was fine. He said he'd been thinking all round that sort of stuff for years, and that now, for one reason and another, it was beginning ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... of the world: >From decay'd fortunes every flatterer shrinks; Men cease to build ...
— The Duchess of Malfi • John Webster
... sooth, but 'tis a marvel unto me. Truly, I might conceive the same in case a maid were rare ill-usen at home— were her father ever harsh unto her, and her mother all day a-nagging at her—then, if the man should show him no mere flatterer, but a true friend, would I not stick to the days she had known him. And yet, as methinks, it should be a strange case wherein a true man should not go boldly and honestly to the maid's father, and ask her of him, with no hole-and-corner work. But ...
— Joyce Morrell's Harvest - The Annals of Selwick Hall • Emily Sarah Holt
... "You flatterer! You dear, bonny lover. You whom I had always loved and prayed for, when I knew not where you were! You who had not left me to be like Mariana, but had hurried home at once for me when your man's work was done,—doing just what a girl ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope
... gave us a very perfect imitation of old Cumberland, who carried the poetic jealousy and irritability further than any man I ever saw. He was a great flatterer too, the old rogue. Will Erskine used to admire him. I think he wanted originality. A very high-bred man in ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... The flatterer was flattered. Having delivered the weighty news, he had leisure to savour his own importance as the bearer of it. He drank a cup of tea. Josiah was thoughtful, but Clara brimmed over with a fascinating loquacity. ...
— Tales of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... are but a flatterer," said Nance, but she did not say it clearly, for what with bewilderment and satisfaction, her heart was ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... for her part, was not slow to reply: she used to say that the defunct Barry was a bankrupt and a beggar; and as for the fashionable society which he saw, he saw it from my Lord Bagwig's side-table, whose flatterer and hanger-on he was known to be. Regarding Mrs. Barry, the lady of Castle Brady would make insinuations still more painful. However, why should we allude to these charges, or rake up private scandal of a hundred years old? It was in the reign of George II that ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... despised her. Surely he was loving this foolish child simply as his duty; his belonging, as his right he might struggle hard for her, and if he gained her, be greatly disappointed; for how could Eustacie appreciate him, little empty-headed, silly thing, who would be amused and satisfied by any court flatterer? ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... feel sure he would not care for any of these other young ladies. I happen to know what he thinks of young ladies. But you—you are so different! I do not wish to be a flatterer, like so many of my shallow kind, but I am sure that he would appreciate the privilege of knowing you, would feel at his ease with you. But of course it all depends upon Mrs. Nunn. She may disapprove of your meeting one with ...
— The Gorgeous Isle - A Romance; Scene: Nevis, B.W.I. 1842 • Gertrude Atherton
... despise those who, in any of their private communications, had the meanness to affect acquiescence in such views. When Denon brought him, after the battle of Wagram, the design of a medal representing an eagle strangling a leopard, Buonaparte rebuked and dismissed the flatterer. "What," said he, "strangling the leopard! There is not a spot of the sea on which the eagle dares show himself. This is base adulation. It would have been nearer the truth to represent the eagle as choked ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... Lake Geneva, and returned honored, great, and feasted to Paris. Indulging in unaccustomed excesses, his frail and aged body sank beneath the weight. But Frederic and Voltaire maintained a correspondence many years after the flatterer's disgrace. Full of trouble, haunted by dreams of conspiracy and of poverty, successful in achieving more evil than usually falls to the lot of a single mind, Voltaire passed from the society of men to ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... me. You leave me in the lurch, and make up to the other girl, just because she is pretty and I am not. Go! I don't love you any longer!" and then she caught the coaxing cat with both hands to her breast, pressed her smooth chin on the white head of the little flatterer, and gazed after the boat. In her eye glittered ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... bears this letter, is alone worthy of seeing you, alone worthy of being seen by you. He who shall see you both together shall see two men whose like will scarce ever be found in the world." And the doctor was no flatterer, as may be inferred from his treatment of Peter the Great. But the aged baronet had had his own way so long, and was so well pleased with it, that he would have nothing to do with Linnaeus. At Oxford the ...
— Hero Tales of the Far North • Jacob A. Riis
... old Play of Plautus)—Ver. 25. Although Nonius Marcellus professes to quote from the Colax of Plautus (so called from the Greek Kolax, "a flatterer" or "parasite"), some scholars have disbelieved in the existence of any Play of Plautus known by that name. Cooke says: "If Plautus had wrote a Play under the title of 'Colax,' I should think it very unlikely that it should have escaped ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... the lordly flatterer's art, That won the maiden's ear,— The fluttering of the frightened heart, The ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... grosse flatterer, and knowe there is More sympathye betwixte mere contraryes Then twixte ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III • Various
... wants and sorrows into spiritual ones, as is evident from their being disciples; and these are the characteristics which He pronounces blessed. In this democratic and socialistic age, it is important to keep clearly in view the fact that Jesus was no flatterer of poor men as such, and did not think that circumstances had such power for good or evil, as that virtue and true blessedness were ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... like a flatterer, I must say it's because of the woods feature that I remember you so well. The forest interests me. I'm afraid I'm inclined to be very foolish about the woods. Why, in a cafeteria—last ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day
... a flatterer. I am going to follow the example of the man who cast pearls before swine—I'm going to cast you a pearl from one of my own poems. You may listen. It will pass your ears, that's all. You cannot contaminate it by taking it in, so I repeat it for ...
— The Landloper - The Romance Of A Man On Foot • Holman Day
... makes him execute his pantomime. Whoever has need of another is indigent, and assumes a posture. The king postures before his mistress, and before God he treads his pantomimic measure. The minister dances the step of courtier, flatterer, valet, and beggar before his king. The crowd of the ambitious cut a hundred capers, each viler than the rest, before the minister. The abbe, with his bands and long cloak, postures at least once ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley
... Antigonus, spoken in the days of Herod, and in a manner to his face, that he was an Idumean, i.e. a half Jew, seems to me of much greater authority than that pretense of his favorite and flatterer Nicolaus of Damascus, that he derived his pedigree from Jews as far backward as the Babylonish captivity, ch. 1. sect. 3. Accordingly Josephus always esteems him an Idumean, though he says his father Antipater was of the same people with the Jews, ch. viii. sect. 1. and by birth a Jew, Antiq. ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... ambergrise, a stink it lies, But well dispersed, is incense to the skies. P. Who starves by nobles, or with nobles eats? The wretch that trusts them, and the rogue that cheats. Is there a lord who knows a cheerful noon Without a fiddler, flatterer, or buffoon? Whose table, wit or modest merit share, Unelbowed by a gamester, pimp, or play'r? Who copies yours or Oxford's better part, To ease the oppressed, and raise the sinking heart? Where'er he shines, O Fortune, gild the scene, And angels guard him in the golden mean! There, ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... that does honor to his memory. This was Lanfranc, a man of great learning for the times, and extraordinary piety. He owed his elevation to William; but though always inviolably faithful, he never was the tool or flatterer of the power which raised him; and the greater freedom he showed, the higher he rose in the confidence of his master. By mixing with the concerns of state he did not lose his religion and conscience, or make them the covers or instruments of ambition; but tempering the fierce policy ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... But they always repelled these overtures with respectful politeness, as they were persuaded that the rich and powerful seek the society of persons in an inferior station only for the sake of surrounding themselves with flatterers, and that every flatterer must applaud alike all the actions of his patron, whether good or bad. On the other hand, they avoided, with equal care, too intimate an acquaintance with the lower class, who are ordinarily jealous, calumniating, and gross. ...
— Paul and Virginia • Bernardin de Saint Pierre
... have earned it sometimes because I must. I have scrupulously spoken the truth, and have been glad to hear it spoken to me. I have thought it better to be neglected than to fawn, to be dumb than to feign, to be seldom a friend than to be often a flatterer. 1 have sought little, deserved not little. So far as I could, I have assisted each according to my means. I have given help readily to the deserving, fearlessly to the undeserving. No one by proving to be ungrateful has made me more slow to bestow promptly all benefits I could ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius
... could loudly celebrate the genius, the magnificence, and the piety of a prince, who, both as a conqueror and legislator, had surpassed the puerile virtues of Cyrus and Themistocles. Disappointment might urge the flatterer to secret revenge, and the first glance of favour might again tempt him to suspend and suppress a libel, in which the Roman Cyrus is degraded into an odious and contemptible tyrant, in which both the Emperor and his consort Theodora are seriously represented as two demons, who had ...
— The Secret History of the Court of Justinian • Procopius
... not to get money, but to reduce the supply, to meet conditions. Money needs were not serious until both banks failed two years ago, and then it became a calamity. And now, my young counselor, adviser, flatterer, and friend, do you think I should seek a job in ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney
... Pasmer was a flatterer, and it cannot be claimed for her that she flattered adroitly always. But adroitness in flattery is not necessary for its successful use. There is no morsel of it too gross for the condor gullet and the ostrich stomach of human ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... at Madame Beavor, said, "And yet, madame, your charming gaiety consoles me amidst all my suffering;" upon which Madame Beavor called him "flatterer," and rapped his knuckles with her fan; the latter proceeding the brave Pole did not seem to like, for he immediately buried his hands in ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Burr, while yet at college, had acquired a reputation for gallantry. On this point he was excessively vain, and regardless of all those ties which ought to control an honourable mind. In his intercourse with females he was an unprincipled flatterer, ever prepared to take advantage of their weakness, their credulity, or their confidence. She that confided in him was lost. In referring to this subject, no terms of condemnation would be too strong to ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... precautions in England would be useless; the libeller or the flatterer would there reach me in spite of all; but in Italy we know little of literary England, and think less, except what reaches us through some garbled and brief extract in some miserable gazette. For two years (excepting two or three articles cut out and sent to you ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron
... Puppy's—for, though we tried many, we never found any other satisfactory name for him but "Puppy"—a reverent admiration and watchful worshipping imitation. No great man was ever more anxiously copied by some slavish flatterer than that old sleepy carelessly-great setter by that eager, ambitious little terrier. The occasions when to bark and when not to bark, for example. One could actually see Puppy studying the old dog's face on doubtful occasions of the kind. Boiling over, as he visibly ...
— Vanishing Roads and Other Essays • Richard Le Gallienne
... not like the Henry Carroll of a month since. You are a flatterer," said Emily, with ...
— Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue • Warren T. Ashton
... did the ancients say it was better to fall into the hands of a raven than a flatterer? A. Because ravens do not eat us till we be dead, but flatterers ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous
... Fontaine. The fourth chant of the Art Poetique is remarkable for its lofty conception of the position of the poet; its counsels express the dignity of the writer's own literary life. He has been charged not only with cruelty as a satirist, but with the baseness of a flatterer of the great. It would be more just to notice the honourable independence which he maintained, notwithstanding his poetical homage to the King, which was an inevitable requisition. Boileau's influence as a critic of literature can hardly be overrated; it has much ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... who ascribed such qualities to a prince who was known to be entirely lacking in them would be regarded as little acquainted with the world and with court manners, for he would cause the person to be publicly ridiculed. In this case the praise would degenerate into satire and the incautious flatterer would fare badly."[203] Flattery has always been the return which court poets make for their slavery. Ariosto and Tasso were no more free from it than were Horace and Virgil. When the poet of the Orlando Furioso discovered that Cardinal Ippolito was beginning to treat him coldly, he ...
— Lucretia Borgia - According to Original Documents and Correspondence of Her Day • Ferdinand Gregorovius
... true self, we must be loyal to it—loyal to our friends against their lower selves as well as against their detractors. Plutarch says, "The influence of a true friend is felt in the help that he gives the noble part of nature; nothing that is weak or poor meets with encouragement from him. While the flatterer fans every spark of suspicion, envy, or grudge, he may be described in the verse of Sophocles as 'sharing the love and not the hatred of the person he cares for.'" Such a bit as that makes us forget the centuries which have rolled between us and Plutarch; his ...
— Stray Thoughts for Girls • Lucy H. M. Soulsby
... and his doctrine were the cause of the revolt, and, however absurd this idea may be, the reformer could not see it so generally entertained without experiencing the deepest grief. On the side of the people, Munzer and all the leaders of the insurrection represented him as a vile hypocrite, a flatterer of the great, and these calumnies easily obtained belief. The violence with which Luther had declared against the rebels had displeased even moderate men. The friends of Rome exulted; all were against him, and he bore the heavy anger of his ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... "Flatterer!" exclaimed Rhoda's mother, laughing. Then she seized upon Nan who chanced to come up the steps directly behind ...
— Nan Sherwood at Rose Ranch • Annie Roe Carr
... "Young flatterer!" she answered, smiling and slightly flushing. "But tell me truly, Traverse, am I very much faded? Have care and toil and grief made me ...
— Hidden Hand • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... frontier posts to the north. But at least there would be the joy of seeing Jess in a few days and showing her his troop—her and Pappoose. How wonderfully that little schoolgirl must have grown and developed! How beautiful a girl she must now be if that photograph was no flatterer! By the way, where was that photo? What had he done with it? For the first time in four days he remembered his picking it up when Mrs. Hal Folsom collapsed at sight of Jake's swooning. Down in the depths of the side pocket of his heavy blue flannel hunting shirt ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King
... crowning of her merits he would be Sumptuously poor, low in Hyperbole. To write is easy; but to write on thee, Truth would be thought to forfeit modesty. He'l seem a Poet that shall speak but true; Hyperbole's in others, are thy due. Like a most servile flatterer he will show Though he write truth, and make the Subject, You. Virtue ne'er dies, time will a Poet raise Born under better Stars, shall sing thy praise. Praise her who list, yet he shall be a debtor For Art ne're feigned, nor ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell |
