"Fool" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... he, "I have been thinking that I am a fool. My life is swept as bare as a hermit's cell. There is nothing in it but a dream, a thought of God, which does not ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... mean to play the fool. But you must admit that it had a queer sound." I repeated the adjectival sentence under my breath. It really was a rather remarkable piece of onomatopoeia. And then I reflected on the absurdity of our conversation. How could we achieve all this ordinary trivial talk of everyday ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... Paris; round us was the park as classical in its lines and masses, and with its note of sadness the stronger because of the tragic memories that haunt it; in the foreground were my companions agreeably playing the fool and posing as living statues on the broken columns: he whose solemnity of demeanour accorded with his belief that his real sphere was the pulpit, throwing out an unaccustomed leg as Mercury on one column, and on another the Architect, an apologetic ...
— Nights - Rome, Venice, in the Aesthetic Eighties; London, Paris, in the Fighting Nineties • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... I can't say," he confessed; "but you have the trick of making friends of any who may give you trouble. It's proud I am to say you can't fool Bantry Hagan and turn his backbone to jelly. Del Norte is dead, but Hagan is alive, and he'll keep you on the ...
— Frank Merriwell's Pursuit - How to Win • Burt L. Standish
... words, Pao-y's mind suddenly became enlightened. "What a fool I am!" he added with a simper; "I couldn't for the moment even remember the lines, ready-made though they were and staring at me in my very eyes! Sister, you really can be styled my teacher, little though ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... "Fool if she doesn't," replied this elegant young gentleman, flippantly. Extremes meet. The naked savage has a fairly low estimate of the value of his womankind, but it is many degrees higher than that of this product of ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang
... to be any doubt about the value of music in restoring health. Nobody is fool enough to suppose that a broken bone would set itself, or fragments of shrapnel emerge of their own accord from a man's leg even if it were possible to secure the services of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham
... speaker; "the fool takes to the water. He'll be drowned; the banks are too high and rough to land man or horse yonder. Hallo!" and with that painful sympathy which the hardest feel at the imminent peril of another when immediately subjected to their eyes, the gipsy ran forth into the pelting storm, shouting ...
— Godolphin, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... answered, good-humoredly, and not the least disturbed by Manning's quiet reflection on the bravery of stage drivers in general. "When a fellow has to manage four tolerably skittish horses with both hands full of leather, he haint much time to fool around huntin' shootin' irons, 'specially when he's got to look down into the muzzle of a repeater which is likely to go off and ...
— The Burglar's Fate And The Detectives • Allan Pinkerton
... a fool like that, no more work from that boy. Don't be a fool and spoil this game. We're out till November. Let's make ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... men would sign. Some one had warned them. This was serious; might be fatal at such a critical point. As he thought it over, his suspicions turned more and more to Sveggum, the old fool that could not write his name at Laersdalsoren. But how did he get there before ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... estimation) far more exact than that of the unenlightened blacks. With eyes sparkling and all his senses quivering under the stress of impatience, he listened to the end, and then burst out, "You fool! That good, big fellow boy, he no boy. That fellow, white man call em ghost! Plenty in ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... you fool! What could you do—run the engine? tend the planers? If I wanted you at all, I should keep ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... since that day here. I knew it was in the wind. What gets in the wind never gets out. [She rises and throws out her arms] Never! It just blows here and there [Desolately] and then—blows home. [Her voice changes to resentment] But I've paid for being a fool— 'tisn't fun, that sort of life, I can tell you. I'm not ashamed and repentant, and all that. If it wasn't for him! I'm afraid he'll never forgive me; it's such a disgrace for him—and then, to have his child! Being fond of him, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... begun already with thy fine lady's notions! thou wilt be crying for high-heeled boots and built-up hair and stays, stays, Mistress, stays wilt be thy first cry—oh, Lambkin, thou art heavy-hearted and I am turning myself into a fool to physic thy risibles;—I wish we were upon the sea at this moment; if it were possible I should have taken thee while thou wert in sleep; but nay, I could not; for thou art a maiden grown and art plump and ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... trick, out at sea day before yesterday, won't hurt our chances any," whispered Fred Radwin, musingly. "Why did you do that fool thing?" whispered Rhinds, with a ...
— The Submarine Boys' Lightning Cruise - The Young Kings of the Deep • Victor G. Durham
... snake, he snatched the bow from Karna and struck him with it on the head. Struck by Bhimasena, the son of Radha, with eyes red in wrath, smiling the while, said unto him repeatedly these words, viz., "Beardless eunuch, ignorant fool and glutton." And Karna said, "Without skill in weapons, do not fight with me. Thou art but a child, a laggard in battle! There, son of Pandu, where occurs a profusion of eatables and drink, there, O wretch, shouldst thou ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... a minor kind of defense," Nance went on, her tone still low with suppressed excitement that was close to dread. "We know that some of them can give you a shock—if you're fool enough to get so close that you can touch them. And they do emit radio impulses on certain wavelengths. Signals—communication...? As for the rest, perhaps you'd better do your own guessing, Frank. But the difference between us ...
— The Planet Strappers • Raymond Zinke Gallun
... would say, "if it isn't I, it will be some one else. I'm not the only one—and look at the squatters. I'm becoming a rich man, and if I were not, I'd be a fool. You had your day, but you were never made to last. Your boots are a comfortable fit, and I propose to wear them. I don't mean yours, by the way. I'm going to look after you. Better think it over ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... Dr. O'Grady. "If Doyle believes you gave L40 for the filly, and if you were to offer her to him for L35 he'd think he was getting a bargain and he'd jump at it. Doyle's just the kind of fool who thinks he knows all about horses and so he's quite an easy man to stick. Come on now, ...
— General John Regan - 1913 • George A. Birmingham
... of India, as we have already seen, Death has a protomartyr, Tama, 'the first of men who reached the river, spying out a path for many.' In spying the path Yama corresponds to Tangaro the Fool, in the myth of the Solomon Islands. But Yama is not regarded as a maleficent being, like Tangaro. The Rig Veda (x. 14) speaks of him as 'King Yama, who departed to the mighty streams and sought out a road for many;' and again, the Atharva Veda names him 'the first of men who died, and ...
— Modern Mythology • Andrew Lang
... halted for us to lay in a supply of forage which was stored there. I was still messing with Major Brown, with whom I went into the village to purchase a supply of provisions for our mess; but unfortunately we were in too jolly a mood to fool away money on "grub." We bought several articles, however, and put them into the ambulance and sent them back to camp with our cook. The major and myself did not return until reveille next morning. Soon afterward the general sounded "boots and ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... menaces the unity of the group. For in this unity is its security, it is sacred, holy, 'taboo,' as the Polynesians say. And it cannot possibly investigate each particular case, whether the seceder is perhaps a faithful follower of Christ, a truly original spirit or simply an eccentric fool or weakling. That the seceder must himself prove In the face of the world's condemnation. Do you ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden
... we are describing occurred, having been that in which Raymond was born, of course the poor fool was familiar to every one in it, as indeed every one in it, young and old, ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... serious treatment. Let us, therefore, begin with definitions. What is a poet? and what is a publisher? Popularly speaking, a poet is a fool, and a publisher is a knave. At least, I am hardly wrong in saying that such is the literal assumption of the Incorporated Society of Authors, a body well acquainted with both. Indeed, that may be said to be its working hypothesis, the very ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne
... laughed. "The rich man can be philanthropic—if he is not a business man, Mr. Cottingham. The latter—if he tries to do good to his fellow-creatures—is dubbed a fool in his business circles and invariably comes to grief. At least that is what Owen tells me. He's double my age, and he ought to know," added the charming ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... that I killed Abel? Who invented killing? Did I? No: he invented it himself. I followed your teaching. I dug and dug and dug. I cleared away the thistles and briars. I ate the fruits of the earth. I lived in the sweat of my brow, as you do. I was a fool. But Abel was a discoverer, a man of ideas, of spirit: a true Progressive. He was the discoverer of blood. He was the inventor of killing. He found out that the fire of the sun could be brought down by a dewdrop. He invented the altar to keep the fire ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw
... might if Bob had any sense—but he's got a fool notion of considering a straight mortgage that those farmers gave on their land as rent, and isn't going to make them redeem their land,—his share of it, I mean,—and if he doesn't do that, he'll not have a cent, and he couldn't lend your father ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... triumphs in the long run, had longed to preserve for her grandson the beautiful illusions of life, and had therefore brought him up in the highest principles; she instilled into him her own delicacy of feeling and made him, to outward appearance, a timid man, if not a fool. The sensibilities of the young fellow, preserved pure, were not worn by contact without; he remained so chaste, so scrupulous, that he was keenly offended by actions and maxims to which the world attached ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... said some things to Emily she won't forget or forgive in a hurry. Don't mind if they've only sunk in a bit. Probably water off a duck's back, though. I said right out: 'You're an old woman, Emily, and there's no fool like an old fool. The man's twenty years younger than you, and don't you fool yourself as to what he married you for. Money! Well, don't let him have too much of it. Farmer Raikes has got a very pretty young wife. Just ask your Alfred how much time he spends ...
— The Mysterious Affair at Styles • Agatha Christie
... tawny color, that fervently squeezed the fingers of a departing friend. "Is that man a scoundrel?" was Mr. Rayburn's first thought, after he had left the hotel. His moral sense set all hesitation at rest—and answered: "You're a fool ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... is dreadful to have to depend on a fool,—to have to trust to a man who cannot tell wrong from right. Your uncle intends to be a good man. If it were brought home to him that he were doing a wrong he would not do it. He would not rob; he would not steal; ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... the road to nowhere What wild oats did you sow When you left your father's house With your cheeks aglow? Eyes so strained and eager To see what you might see? Were you thief or were you fool Or most ...
— General William Booth enters into Heaven and other Poems • Vachel Lindsay
... current through the town,— Says I, 'Do tell me, Doctor, what befell.'— 'Why, dearest lady, there is nought to tell; 'I ponder'd on the proper'st mode to treat him— 'The dog was impudent, and so I beat him! 'Tom, like a fool, proclaim'd his fancied wrongs; 'Others, that I belabour'd, ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... to be a fool," said Sweyn, losing patience. "Another, who was not your brother, might believe you to be a knave, and guess that you had transformed White Fell into a Were-Wolf because she smiled more readily on me ...
— The Were-Wolf • Clemence Housman
... man," Pablo answered with just the correct shade of deprecation, "but long time ago I have feel like my corazon—my heart—goin' make barbecue in my belly. I am in love. I know. Nobody can fool me. An' those boy, Don Miguel, I tell you, senor, hee's crazy for love weeth the ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... to save in that part of the country, and that the day of grace was past and gone for him; that he had overstood the time of mercy. "Oh that he had turned sooner!" was then his cry. "Oh that he had turned seven years before! What a fool he had been to trifle away his time till his soul and heaven were lost!" The text, "compel them to come in, and yet there is room," came to his rescue when he was so harassed and faint that he was "scarce able to take one step more." He found them ...
— The Life of John Bunyan • Edmund Venables
... we've conquered. We hear dark things of India, and worse of Africa. And hear the roaring of the Jingoes! Johnson defined Patriotism you know, as the last refuge of a scoundrel; it looks as if it might presently be the last refuge of a fool." ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... cried the good German woman. "You make your poor mamma tell things to fool you, else you vould sthay avay an' blay. She haf to bribe you to make you help her like you should. Shame! Undt she nodt go to de school ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... honor among horse-thieves than this man had shown towards me. I put into the business between four and five thousand dollars, worked hard almost a year, and have received about five hundred dollars. —— is trying to scare me by threatening to sue me for perjury; so that if he could make me fool enough to pay the debts of —— & Co., he would have just so much more to put into his own pocket. When he can get a grand jury to find a true bill against me for fraud or perjury, I will promise to go to Wethersfield and ...
— History of the American Clock Business for the Past Sixty Years, - and Life of Chauncey Jerome • Chauncey Jerome
... letters, strums on the cithern, and pretends to draw with crayon. He took it into his head to attempt the portrait of Madam de Luxembourg; the sketch he produced was horrid. She said it did not in the least resemble her and this was true. The traitorous abbe consulted me, and I like a fool and a liar, said there was a likeness. I wished to flatter the abbe, but I did not please the lady who noted down what I had said, and the abbe, having obtained what he wanted, laughed at me in his turn. I perceived by the ill success of ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... then, to the prophets and proverb-makers of Israel, and then to the New Testament for the true teaching on the eye, I come, in the first place, on that so pungent saying of Solomon that 'the eyes of a fool are in the ends of the earth.' Look at that born fool, says Solomon, who has his eyes and his heart committed to him to keep. See him how he gapes and stares after everything that does not concern him, and lets the door of his own heart stand open to every entering thief. London is a city of ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... There!—what a fool she was, to get into such a taking when, ten to one, she had only dropped something, and he was running after her to restore it. She faced about, and looked full ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... coat. MY maxim is to bear all, to put up with water if you cannot get Burgundy, and if you have no velvet to be content with frieze. But Burgundy and velvet are the best, bien entendu, and the man is a fool who will not seize the best when ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... hold of a weak fool, who is also dishonest,' I said, 'the two together may make a formidable combination. But never mind. We're forewarned. I think I shall ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... object, which may divert him from his fanatical meditations. Is this virtue? Is a being of this type, kind to himself, or useful to others? Would not society be dissolved, and man return to a savage state, if every one were fool enough to ...
— Good Sense - 1772 • Paul Henri Thiry, Baron D'Holbach
... which all property is held by the parable of a certain rich man who had much goods laid up, who congratulated himself upon this fact and proposed to pull down his barns and build greater, saying to his soul, "Take thine ease, eat drink and be merry," but God said, "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be which thou hast ...
— Studies in the Life of the Christian • Henry T. Sell
... calling a good-bye to the Major, of the choke in the officer's voice as he answered. He was an older man, and his expression of feeling nearly upset Tom. He trudged on, file-closer for the front rank and six-feet-one of target, and wondered if he had been a fool after all. It was well enough for those people yelling acclaim from street and housetop; but they were going back home, or down to the University, and he—to the troopship, and the high seas, and after that no telling. The strap of his knapsack hurt him. They said that Manila was a furnace. ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field
... can be no question about,' answered Emilius, in high indignation. 'Making a caricature of yourself, and making a fool of yourself, are among the pleasures you are always driving after ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... inflicted on his sensitive and truth-loving nature. The folly and baseness of his fellow-creatures stung him, as he once wrote to Pope, "to perfect rage and resentment." Turn where he would, he found either the knave as the slave driver, or the slave as a fool, and the latter became even a willing sacrifice. His indignation at the one was hardly greater than his contempt for the other, and his different feelings found trenchant expression in such writings as the "Drapier's Letters," the "Modest Proposal," ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. VI; The Drapier's Letters • Jonathan Swift
... out to the very edge of things and tried to think! What endeavor she made to get out of her mind that which was not in it! She could not but feel that it was all because she was "such a fool"—for she could hardly believe that a whole country could be so lacking ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... your pardon," he said, sinking back into his seat with an air of weariness and discouragement that would have touched the heart of a tender-natured man, such as was Brother Dino of San Stefano. "I must be an utter fool to have spoken as I did. You knew my father, did you? That ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... worst of all is that sin is a wrong against God. Man sins, of course, against himself. That is written large on human affairs, so that no fool, however great a fool, may miss it. Well may the prophet say, "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself!" Men mix the hemlock for themselves! The sinner is ...
— Our Master • Bramwell Booth
... I should be ashamed if I couldn't persuade ever so many men to do any right thing I wanted. Shouldn't I be a fool to swap off that influence for the rights that only one ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... That life of pleasure, and that soul of whim! Gallant and gay, in Cliveden's proud alcove, The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love; Or just as gay, at Council, in a ring Of mimic statesmen, and their merry king, No wit to flatter, left of all his store! No fool to laugh at, which he valued more. There, victor of his health, of fortune, friends, And fame, this lord ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... fool sailormen, Miss Bostwick," continued the old man, shaking his head with great solemnity. "They sees too much and they knows too much. Sutro Brothers had got rid of the Marlin B.'s first crew and picked up strangers, but murder will out. The story come to us through the night and in the snow ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... you that the two checks were signed by me for two and for five dollars, and given into the hands of my daughter. If she was fool enough to let them pass into the clutches of her rascally son, she must take the consequences, and remember, sir, you'll get no money out of me. I'll have my ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley
... he thus began: "If you think, Mr. Wild, by the force of your arguments, to get the money out of my pocket, you are greatly mistaken. What is all this stuff to me? D—n me, I am a man of honour, and, though I can't talk as well as you, by G—you shall not make a fool of me; and if you take me for one, I must tell you you are a rascal." At which words he laid his hand to his pistol. Wild, perceiving the little success the great strength of his arguments had met with, ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding
... it instead of being its blind slave. Just as does the skilled swimmer turn this way and that way, going and coming as he will, instead of being as the log which is carried here and there—so is the wise man as compared to the ordinary man—and yet both swimmer and log; wise man and fool, are subject to Law. He who understands this is well on the road to ...
— The Kybalion - A Study of The Hermetic Philosophy of Ancient Egypt and Greece • Three Initiates
... worst of it. I don't believe he would have known me but for my being such a fool as to call out his name. He were a Southampton man, in a strange place, or else I should never have been so ready to call cousins with him, a nasty, good-for-nothing fellow. Says he, "Miss Dixon! who would ha' thought of seeing ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... as he came out of a house of ill fame blush at being seen by Castruccio, and said to him: "Thou shouldst not be ashamed when thou comest out, but when thou goest into such places." A friend gave him a very curiously tied knot to undo and was told: "Fool, do you think that I wish to untie a thing which gave so much trouble to fasten." Castruccio said to one who professed to be a philosopher: "You are like the dogs who always run after those who will give them the best ...
— The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli
... never wholly failed him. For weeks and weeks his eagle eye, ever on the alert to spy out a vulnerable point in that seemingly immaculate coat-of-mail, scanned the redoubts from Cape Rouge to the Montmorenci. There was no fool-hardiness—no wilful throwing away of life—but there was much to be dared, and much to be left to mere chance. Whenever there seemed to be any, even the slightest, prospect of effecting an opening, that chance was greedily ...
— Canadian Notabilities, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... little Raphael!' she said, laughing the words into the yellow beard of the sea-thief who clipped her, and again she nodded at me, in no ways discomposed by the strangeness of her position. But I, poor fool, could not bear it, and I turned and ran down the stairs as if the Devil himself ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... Barton was no fool. No need to tell him that were all men equal to-night, some would get the start by rising an hour earlier to-morrow. Nor yet did he care for goods, nor wealth—no man less, so that he could get daily bread for him and his; but what hurt him sore, ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... third day, Mr. George Morris woke up after a sound and dreamless sleep. He woke up feeling very dissatisfied with himself, indeed. He said he was a fool, which was probably true enough, but even the calling himself so did not seem to make matters any better. He reviewed in his mind the events of the day before. He remembered his very pleasant walk and talk with Miss Earle. He knew the talk had been rather ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr
... express different views, they learn tolerance. A party slave will not come out from such a home. The children will grow up seeing that it is un-American to say that everybody in the opposite party is either a fool or a knave. The two best features of equal suffrage are the improvement of the individual woman and the prospective ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... For my part, I should be content with some light employment: would erect a cheap palace, transport a light-weight princess, threaten a small cripple—or jobs of that kind. What are the prospects of the fool crop?" ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... "More fool he who tries it," said Braith, and looked at Gethryn with an affectionate smile that made him ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... bells—which are commoner in the southern counties. Blackened faces are common in both, and both have the same grotesque figures, a man and a woman, often called Tommy and Bessy in the sword-dance and "the fool" and Maid Marian in the morris. Moreover the morris-dancers in England sometimes use swords, and in one case the performers of an undoubted sword-dance were called "morrice" dancers in the eighteenth century. Bells too, so characteristic of the morris, are mentioned ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles
... asked whether the gentleman was a fool or took her to be one, that he asked her to give up what she had just told him was the greatest treasure she had in the world,—her sure means of revenge upon ...
— The Billow and the Rock • Harriet Martineau
... whenever he'd jump two feet out of the water, and turn over! I'll never forget how finely you handled him, either, Jack, old chum! Now, if it had been me I'd like as not have got so excited I'd lost my fish by some fool play. But that ought to be enough for even Steve, and so I reckon we must ...
— Jack Winters' Campmates • Mark Overton
... work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars which Thou hast ordained. What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that Thou shouldest so regard him?' (Psalm viii.) 'Thou madest him lower than the angels, to crown him with glory.' Here is matter of praise and gladness. 'The fool,' as the Psalmist expresses it, 'hath said in his heart, There is no God.' Or, let us consider the man, who is content to own an invisible power, yet tries to believe, that when man has done living on this earth he lives no more: but I would ask, if any ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... woke up that weary morning. But that was ower late, and to wait on by mysel' in Thrums for what might happen, and me a single woman—I daredna! So I flattered at him, and flattered at him, till I got the fool side o' him, and he ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... responsible persons do their best we can expect no more. But this case is different: the Governor acted on a wrong system; he took upon himself an unnecessary responsibility:' and so a Governor who incurred disaster by disregarding his skilled counsellor would be thought a fool in the City for ever. In consequence, the one skilled counsellor would in fact rule the Bank. I believe that the appointment of the new permanent and skilled authority at the Bank is the greatest reform which can be made there, and that ...
— Lombard Street: A Description of the Money Market • Walter Bagehot
... perhaps among the many doves that fly about the towers, it might not be that a white one, as he said, should have chosen to settle in the place he pointed out to me, 'for,' thought I, 'he will be quiet then and satisfied.' And like a blind fool I went—and when I came back the platform was empty!—Ah, Monseigneur!—he had said good-night indeed, ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... paragraph with a shrug, and that one with a smirk. I was in no manner surprised at the announcement that Miss High-Culture was going to wed the Duke of Impecune; I had always been certain this girl would do some such fool thing. That Mrs. Hyphen-Bonds was giving a farewell dinner at the Waldorf, prior to her departure to Europe, interested my curiosity not in the least degree. It would be all the same to me if she never came ...
— Hearts and Masks • Harold MacGrath
... an ass I had made of myself. Of course, the priest was perfectly right (I saw that before I got ten yards away, though I wouldn't acknowledge it for another five miles). I was a dirty tramp, and I talked like a brazen fool. (I remember thinking my 'openness' to him rather fine and manly!) Well, ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson
... apologize to you for breaking in upon you this way," said young Rideout, "but he came out in the car this afternoon, and we didn't know where he had gone. He made the chauffeur wait at the corner at the bottom of the hill, and the fool man waited an hour before it occurred to him to telephone me at the house. I came ...
— Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories • Kathleen Norris
... right; the Union was coming along at full speed; yet her captain was not quite such a fool as the young man took him to be. He had seen the two Chilians from his mastheads before they had seen him; and he had been watching them closely ever since; with the result that he had arrived at ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood
... until I read "Trout-Fishing in Brooks," by G. Garrow-Green. The thing is appalling. Evidently the sport is nothing but a constant series of compromises with one's better nature, what with sneaking about pretending to be something that one is not, trying to fool the fish into thinking one thing when just the reverse is true, and in general behaving in an underhanded and tricky manner throughout ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... Jeff. "That's what your silly friends tell you. But it doesn't matter. I won't have him doing it in my house. You thought, just because I was crippled and couldn't get around or out of these confounded four rooms, that you could fool me. But you can't, you see. And now I'm going to give you and Brooks your choice,—either he stops painting, or out you both go. Now which ...
— On With Torchy • Sewell Ford
... his trial with offhand indifference that he supposed he had murdered about seventy people first and last. When a brother priest was sent to give him the consolations of religion, Ciro cut him short, saying, "Stop that chatter, we are two of a trade: we need not play the fool to one another" (Lasciate queste chiacchiere, siamo dell' istessa professione: non ci burliamo fra noi). Every successive revolutionary disturbance in Naples saw a recrudescence of brigandage down to the unification of 1860-1861, and then it was years before the Italian government ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... is no time to lose. I am off for the crag this very minute. Thou must quietly collect and arm a few of our stanchest men, together with the English servants left here with their young mistress. Let all be done secretly and quietly, and come after me with all speed. It may be that we are on a fool's errand, and that our fears are groundless. But truly it may be that our brothers are about to betray our guest into the hands of one ...
— The Lord of Dynevor • Evelyn Everett-Green
... dreaming the dreams of girl-hood. She has received Bluebeard's message of love, and is awaiting his coming as the hero of her heart's romance. This "Traum" theme is almost precisely like the "Guileless Fool Motive" of "Parsifal," and the application to Fatima ...
— Bluebeard • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... desired, Sir Patrick Drummond openly recommended. In his eyes, Malcolm would be no better than a fool if he let his ladye- love, with all her lands, slip through his fingers, when she was lawfully his own. Patrick held that a monastery was a good place to be nursed in if wounded, and a convenience for disposing of dull or weakly younger sons; and he ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... old thing away hours ago. Not such a fool as I look," answered Chris rudely.—"I'm going through here, so you can just stop your row," he continued insolently to the gatekeeper, with a vague idea of obtaining admiration from the crowds now coming out ...
— Archie's Mistake • G. E. Wyatt
... comfortable sleep; all living slept But that great queen, who more than half the night Had paced from door to fire and fire to door. Though now in her old age, in her young age She had been beautiful in that old way That's all but gone; for the proud heart is gone And the fool heart of the counting-house fears all But soft beauty and indolent desire. She could have called over the rim of the world Whatever woman's lover had hit her fancy, And yet had been great bodied ...
— In The Seven Woods - Being Poems Chiefly of the Irish Heroic Age • William Butler (W.B.) Yeats
... mercy if you don't. No, child, there is not much the matter for you. The matter's for me and these girls here. Well, to be sure! there's no fool like an old f—Caroline! (I fairly jumped) can't you look what you are doing? You are herring-boning that seam ...
— Out in the Forty-Five - Duncan Keith's Vow • Emily Sarah Holt
... all this misery, Thus and no otherwise the thing should be. Would I were dead, my wretched beauty gone, No trouble now to thee or any one!" And with that last word did she hang her head, As one who hears not, whatsoe'er is said; But Venus rising with a dreadful cry Said, "O thou fool, I will not let thee die! But thou shalt reap the harvest thou hast sown And many a day thy wretched lot bemoan. Thou art my slave, and not a day shall be But I will find some fitting task for thee, Nor will I ...
— The Earthly Paradise - A Poem • William Morris
... wish you would take a seat on the steps beside me here, so that I can consult you if necessary." After this effective and affecting speech he leaned down until he was close to my ear, and said: "Chauncey, how long do you think it will be before that d—— drunken fool will be able to return and take ...
— My Memories of Eighty Years • Chauncey M. Depew
... not merely Mighty, mighty, mighty, but "Holy, holy, holy." How awful to poor creatures like us. For then comes in the question—not merely is God good? but, am not I bad? Is God sinless? but, am not I a sinner? Is God pure? but am not I impure? Is God wise? then am not I a fool? And when once that thought has crossed our minds, must we not tremble, must we not say with Isaiah of old, "Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of ...
— All Saints' Day and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... is scarcely likely. You were always pretty dependable, Robin. And I'm no longer an ignorant little fool to rush thoughtlessly in where either angels or devils might fear ...
— The Hidden Places • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... seems, art that forsaken fool, Who, wanting merit to preserve her heart, Repines in vain to see it better placed; But know, (for now I take a pride to grieve thee) Thou art so lost a thing in her esteem, I never heard thee named, but some scorn followed: Thou wert our ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... beautiful ladies—beautiful, that is to say, with the aid of one of the costumers up the street and a liberal supply of cosmetics—who will inveigle any young man you want dealt with into any sort of situation, provided he is fool enough and the pay is good. I'm an all-round man still, Wingate, but my nose is a little closer to the ground ...
— The Profiteers • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... every preparation to fill his old townsmen with admiration and envy. But things had changed, even in Lambrig. There was a new innkeeper, who could answer none of his questions, and who did not remember Minister Anderson and his daughter, Jean. He began to fear he had come on a fool's errand, and after a leisurely, late breakfast, he strolled out to make ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... the baronet, striding up and down, "Peter, you are a fool, sir, a hot-headed, self-sufficient, pragmatical young fool, ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... blunders were ever made by statesmen and diplomats as were made at the beginning of this war. Just think of one Government being wrong in all these particulars at the same time! Lincoln said, "You can't fool all of the people all of the time." Yes, that may be true in a republic, but you certainly can fool all the diplomats and Generals and do it all the time—during July and August, in any event. Call the roll of the diplomatic blunders, and the list is long. First, England ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... they were abashed at that, for they tried to laugh it off, and go on with their carouse. Indeed I think they meant only to frighten me all the while, so perhaps I was a fool to take it all in earnest. However that be, I finished my supper and bade them all good-night; whereat they laughed again. Then, as an hour of daylight remained, I called for my horse and resolved to ride to the next inn and lie there for ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... ever seen!" he exclaimed. "It'll bring a big price at Mingen. That boy'll never see it again, an' I'll clean out th' rest o' th' fur too, at th' river. Old Campbell'll be sorry when I get through with 'em, he let that feller hunt th' path. He's a fool, an' if he gives me th' slip he'll go back an' say th' Mingen Injuns took his fur. I fixed that wi' my story all right. I'll take th' lot t' Mingen an' get cash fer 'em, an' be back t' th' Bay with open water with 'nuff martens so's they won't ...
— Ungava Bob - A Winter's Tale • Dillon Wallace
... the General, in a sad and almost supplicating tone, "I am an old fool—an overgrown child—but I feel that this miserable letter will poison my life. I shall have no more an hour of peace and confidence. What can you expect? I was so cruelly deceived before. I am an honorable ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... "Fool!" cried Heselrigge, driven from his assumed temper by her steady denial. "What? is it easier for these dainty limbs to be hacked to pieces by my soldiers' axes? Is it easier for that fair bosom to be trodden underfoot by my horse's hoofs, and for that beauteous head of thine to decorate my lance? ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... gambler remains a burden and a threat to honest society. Gambling, lotteries, and speculation cause embezzlement, crime, unhappy homes, and wrecked lives.[6] Here are to be found with difficulty the true boundaries between ethics and expediency. A busybody despotism may protect the fool, but it thereby helps to perpetuate and multiply his folly; yet if the fool is left alone, he too often is a plague to the wise and ...
— Modern Economic Problems - Economics Vol. II • Frank Albert Fetter
... for if she can control the officials, she will see that such laws are passed as will enable her to coil her slimy self about the vitals of Protestant America, and just as long as the Protestant denominations allow themselves to be made Protestant simpletons of, just that long Catholicism will fool Protestant hosts by offering the "vote bait" to ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... little fool refuses to marry me now!" exclaimed Nuwell in exasperation. "If she hadn't refused, do you think I'd have brought her here? But I couldn't take her to one of the cities, except as a prisoner to be tried for sedition and treason, as long as she expresses this violent ...
— Rebels of the Red Planet • Charles Louis Fontenay
... the time," he said, "but how could a feller be expected to know when you talked the fool way ...
— Phyllis - A Twin • Dorothy Whitehill
... gazing gloomily on the foaming lake, a black bear was perceived walking slowly round the bottom of the bay formed by the point on which we were encamped. It was hopeless to attempt killing him, as Mr Bruin was not fool enough to permit us to attack him with axes. After this a regular course of high winds commenced, which retarded us very much, and gave us much uneasiness as well as annoyance. A good idea of the harassing nature of our voyage across Lake ...
— Hudson Bay • R.M. Ballantyne
... the bottom, of course, where I told you she would go. You were a fool to leave her out there in the deep water. She has gone down where you will ...
— Haste and Waste • Oliver Optic
... holiday in which there are no dullards and no bores; all the world is strong and young and full of health, and there is nothing to remind one of horrible things. Malaga, I know, is the most delightful place in Andalusia. Oh, how refreshing it is to get away from sober fact, but what a fool I should be ever ...
— The Land of The Blessed Virgin; Sketches and Impressions in Andalusia • William Somerset Maugham
... and reconsidered the subject we talked upon today. Nothing on earth shall make me risk the possibility of the Prince's goodness to me furnishing an opportunity for a single scurrilous fool's presuming to hint even that he had, in the slightest manner, departed from the slightest engagement. The Prince's right, in point of law and justice, on the present occasion to recall the appointment given, I hold to be incontestible; but, believe me, I am right in the proposition ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore
... be that you are such a fool, said King Haraldr, that you have not heard about the war between these two countries? Or do you think your luck so good that you will be able to bring valuable possessions to Denmark, while others cannot get there unmolested, even though ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... themselves here and there to guard us, and the Natives prowling about armed and excited. On calling them, they explained the meaning of what Youwili had done, and that they were determined to protect us. I said. "This must not continue. Are you to permit one young fool to defy us all, and break up the Lord's work on Aniwa? If you cannot righteously punish him, I will shut myself up in my house and withdraw from all attempts to teach or help you, till the vessel comes, and then I ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton
... by me, Mr. Stumptail, and you too, Mr. One Tusk, and you also, Bumper Head. Come, we will rush at the fence of this trap and batter it down. In that way we can get out. We shall fool these hunters yet. Come, we will batter down the fence and once more we ...
— Umboo, the Elephant • Howard R. Garis
... Blindness, by all Powers of Hell Which Hate, to whom in sacrifice he fell, My Hope shall walk not in the house of Fear, While on my hearth one fire yet burneth clear, One lover, one Aigisthos, as of old! What should I fear, when fallen here I hold This foe, this scorner of his wife, this toy And fool of each Chryseis under Troy; And there withal his soothsayer and slave, His chanting bed-fellow, his leman brave, Who rubbed the galleys' benches at his side. But, oh, they had their guerdon as they died! For ...
— Agamemnon • Aeschylus
... is a clever man," said he with great vehemence. "No one can deny it. It's a fool that denies it. Look at his hat. There's a sixty-ounce brain inside it—a big engine, running smooth, and turning out clean work. Show me the engine-house and I'll tell you the size of the engine. ...
— The Poison Belt • Arthur Conan Doyle
... indignity was offered to the cardinal by private pique and public satire. Several lords, following Count Egmont's example, had a kind of capuchon or fool's-cap embroidered on the liveries of their varlets; and it was generally known that this was meant as a practical parody on the cardinal's hat. The crowd laughed heartily at this stupid pleasantry; and the coarse satire of the times may be judged ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... morning sun was hot. The way was so uninteresting that we almost wished ourselves back in Nova Scotia. The sandy road was bordered with discouraged evergreens, through which we had glimpses of sand-drifted farms. If Baddeck was to be like this, we had come on a fool's errand. There were some savage, low hills, and the Judique Mountain showed itself as we got away from the town. In this first stage, the heat of the sun, the monotony of the road, and the scarcity of sleep during the past thirty-six hours were all unfavorable to our keeping on the wagon-seat. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... replied, "I, whom you call a fool, got it by sneezing under the King's golden throne; such a lucky sneeze, that the soothsayers prophesied to the King long life and many ...
— The Talking Thrush - and Other Tales from India • William Crooke
... protest has its daily papers that are distinctive and published for that purpose, and that purpose only. It has its magazines and tens of thousands of weekly papers. Only a fool sneers at such a ...
— Our Day - In the Light of Prophecy • W. A. Spicer
... the elder Wertheimer that, when some one expressed his astonishment at the price which he had given for an item, and even insinuated his want of wisdom, he retorted pleasantly that he might be a fool, but he thought that he ...
— The Book-Collector • William Carew Hazlitt
... after all these years. He hasn't got many more years to live, and has seemed so perfectly secure in his possession that I hadn't the heart to show the codicil to him. Of course, I know most people would call me a fool—our old lawyer practically did so—but I put off doing anything about it, as much for the sake of Roger, perhaps, as ...
— The Carved Cupboard • Amy Le Feuvre
... she said, "that you're a greater fool even than poor Samuel. Is not your engagement to a nice, gentlemanly, clever man like Jasper Quentyns the one ray of brightness in this desolate day? You, child, at least ...
— A Young Mutineer • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... confidently expected that war would shake a ramshackle British Empire to its foundations; there would be rebellions in Ireland, India, and South Africa, and the self-governing Dominions would at least refuse to participate in Great Britain's European adventures. In such circumstances "the flannelled fool at the wicket and the muddied oaf at the goal" might be trusted to hug his island security and stick to his idle sports; and the most windy and patriotic of popular British weeklies was at the end of July placarding the streets of London with the ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... already begun to recover from the blow; he was struggling to sit up, and he saw what Joel did, and cried aloud: "Don't be a fool, boy. Keep them.... Hell!" For the weapons were gone. Joel turned, and looked down at him; ...
— All the Brothers Were Valiant • Ben Ames Williams
... struggling feebly to free myself, and feeling so glad he held me tight. "It is impossible, all the same, and that only makes it harder. Christopher is coming to see me at four, and I promised Lady Ver I would not be a fool, and ...
— Red Hair • Elinor Glyn
... reasonless persistence was beginning to irritate him. Indeed, on one occasion, he informed me that I had as many vagaries in my head as a "bed-ridden hag," and with great fervor he "wished to the Lord there was a law in this land for the ham-stringing of such fool idiots, as that habitant Mute, who led ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut
... I said, 'we are one.' 'Yes,' he said, 'and I will tell you: we will take you as our leader,' he said. 'There is only one small thing, and that is, we must, of course, be independent to the rest of the world.' I said, 'No; you take me either for a rogue or a fool. I would be a rogue to forget all my history and traditions; and I would be a fool, because I would be hated by my own countrymen and mistrusted by yours.' From that day he assumed a most acrid tone in his ...
— Lord Milner's Work in South Africa - From its Commencement in 1897 to the Peace of Vereeniging in 1902 • W. Basil Worsfold
... made to play the fool. He is set on a chair in the middle of the room, dressed up as fancy pleases the audience. His face is often absurdly painted, and after enduring every indignity, to the amusement of his friends, he is escorted ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... that you read about in dime novels, but he certainly did have about him a plausible air. I took him out and showed him our fleet. Then I showed him the army, and after he had looked them over he said to me, 'Bill, you could lick the world,' And I was damn fool enough to ...
— Best Short Stories • Various
... careless fool," growled Malcolm, "when we struck the road I was so intent upon getting to the auto that I did not realize the book had dropped out. We hadn't a second to lose," he explained for the third time to Cherry. "The soldiers were searching in the yard when Malinkoff found the ...
— The Book of All-Power • Edgar Wallace
... "Thou fool," cried the old chief, "thou wast my son! Thou makest thyself an enemy! Thou lovest us not, though we saved thy life! Wouldst kill me, too?" Then, with a rough push to a mat on the ground, "Chagon—now, be merry! It's a merry ...
— Pathfinders of the West • A. C. Laut
... do anything so much to his own advantage," was the dry response. "Poor Reckage is a brilliant fool—he's ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes |
