"Humble" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... better had been allotted than that he should tranquilly await the summons of death. It is a striking circumstance that the fullness of greatness for one who had been Senator, Minister to England, Secretary of State, and President, remained to be won in the comparatively humble position of a ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... know them, for what they truly were, we cannot from any past records of art influence yet conceive. But in my next address it will be partly my endeavour to show you how much more useful, because more humble, the labour of great masters might have been, had they been content to bear record of the souls that were dwelling with them on earth, instead of striving to give a deceptive glory to those they dreamed ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... hard. Diana, looking at him thought of what this man meant to the nation, of what his service had been and would be: she thought of the great gifts with which nature had endowed him and she could not bear to have him humble ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow
... with its bare walls, hewn from a corner of the sky. It was adorned only with one great portrait, hers, nothing but hers, smiling in the place of honour, and again, down there, on the table in a gilt frame. This humble little lodging, so light when all Paris was becoming dark, made an extraordinary impression on her, in spite of the poverty of its sparse furniture, scattered in two rooms, its common chintz, and its chimney garnished ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... wiping his eyes, "This sudden descent was an awful surprise. It inclines me to think,—you may laugh at my views,— That a seat that is humble is safest to choose. ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf; a Practical Plan of Character Building, Volume I (of 17) - Fun and Thought for Little Folk • Various
... young girls to see that their ordinary language was not humble enough for their new circumstances. They would make mistakes at every turn, like Dorothy, who got out the best china and brewed her tea ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... your teachers are wisest when they make you content in quiet virtue, and that literature and art are best for you which point out, in common life, and in familiar things, the objects for hopeful labor, and for humble love. ...
— The Elements of Drawing - In Three Letters to Beginners • John Ruskin
... to hear me and Protagoras discoursing, you must ask him to shorten his answers, and keep to the point, as he did at first; if not, how can there be any discussion? For discussion is one thing, and making an oration is quite another, in my humble opinion. ...
— Protagoras • Plato
... wanting to work, despite the possession of French clothes and the use of a limousine. Her "friend," it seemed, needed to be taught some sort of lesson. Grant would come around before to-morrow night, and eat enough humble pie to induce Galbraith to take ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... strive to emulate Knox in prayer, courage, self-denial, and pure-heartedness? Will not his example be to us an inspiration to work with faith and might, to build up the Church and enlarge the Kingdom of Christ? He was great because he was humble and trusted in the Lord. The same way is still open to all who would do great things for God. Humility, prayer, faith, activity, courage, honor, glory—these are the successive steps upward. There is yet room in the high places. ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters
... all the people babbling about that self-same dead man, whom he has fled so far to avoid the sight and thought of, will you not allow that his natural rights have been infringed? He has been deprived of his city of refuge, and, in my humble opinion, ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... stream, should have failed for all these years to notice these simple points; and now suddenly make a fetish of them because they have come out of the mouth of a foreigner. Is it because no one except a foreign doctor can discover such facts? Why even a humble learner like myself, though not so learned even to the extent of one ten-thousandth part of his knowledge, more than ten years ago anticipated what the good doctor has said; and I said much more and in much more comprehensive ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale
... a very humble grade, by Ghazee-od Deen Hyder, and about the year 1825 he had become as great a favourite with him as he afterwards became with his son, Nuseer-od Deen Hyder, and he abused his master's favour in the same manner. The minister, Aga Meer, finding ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... with no Miltonian fire, No favouring Muse her morning dreams inspire? Yet softer claims the melting heart engage, Her youth laborious, and her blameless age; 30 Hers the mild merits of domestic life, The patient sufferer, and the faithful wife. Thus graced with humble Virtue's native charms, Her grandsire leaves her in Britannia's arms; Secure with peace, with competence to dwell, While tutelary nations guard her cell. Yours is the charge, ye fair! ye wise! ye brave! 'Tis yours ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... Serenity; he still praised temperately and blamed humanely; but now he brought to the enforcement of his literary judgment the aid of a delicious playfulness. Cardinal Newman was not ashamed to talk of "chucking" a thing off, or getting into a "scrape." So perhaps a humble disciple may be permitted to say that Arnold pointed ...
— Matthew Arnold • G. W. E. Russell
... resigned; Alvarez was plunged in misery; Zamore was indomitable to the last. But lo! when the Governor spoke, it was seen at once that an extraordinary change had come over his mind. He was no longer proud, he was no longer cruel, he was no longer unforgiving; he was kind, humble, and polite; in short, he had repented. Everybody was pardoned, and everybody recognised the truth of Christianity. And their faith was particularly strengthened when Don Gusman, invoking a final blessing upon Alzire and Zamore, expired in the arms of Don Alvarez. ...
— Books and Characters - French and English • Lytton Strachey
... to hear it," he answered. "I like to see my proud love looking humble for a few minutes; I like to know that I have caged a bright, wild bird that no ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme
... the Gospel from one side to the other. New inscription of Jansoulet's signature upon a slip, which the governor pockets with a negligent air and which operates on his person a sudden transformation. The Paganetti who was so humble and spiritless just now, goes away with the assurance of a man worth four hundred thousand francs, while Monpavon, carrying it even higher than usual, follows after him in his steps, and watches over him with a ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... bier, four great nobles held the cords of the pall, and the Prince's horse followed splendidly caparisoned and led by his equerry. In the midst of the train of counts and barons there was seen a young man, eighteen years of age, who was destined to inherit the glorious legacy of the dead, to humble the Spanish arms, and to compel Spain to sue for a truce and to recognize the independence of the Netherlands. That young man was Maurice of Orange, the son of William, on whom the Estates of Holland a short time after the death of his father conferred the dignity of Stadtholder, and ...
— Holland, v. 1 (of 2) • Edmondo de Amicis
... great words. Mathilde, accustomed all her life to receive information from her mother, received this; and for the first time felt the egotism of her beauty awake, a sense of her own importance the more vivid because she had always been humble-minded. She did not look at her mother; she sat up very straight and stared as if at new fields before her, while a faint smile flickered at the corners of her mouth—a smile of an awakening sense ...
— The Happiest Time of Their Lives • Alice Duer Miller
... in this way. I had proposed a match between our villain and the daughter of the local chemist, a singularly noble and pure-minded girl, the humble but ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... chapter, I have told you how a humble tribe of Persian shepherds had suddenly gone upon the warpath and had conquered the greater part of western Asia. The Persians were too civilised to plunder their new subjects. They contented themselves with a yearly ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... of the life and character of this distinguished man more in detail, more eloquently, with more finished oratory, but I yield to none in the sincerity of my humble ...
— Memorial Addresses on the Life and Character of William H. F. Lee (A Representative from Virginia) • Various
... and humble, thrust the young woman towards the canvas, hiding behind her, so as to escape the gaze of the drowned man. But she escaped, and he wanted to brazen the matter out. Approaching the picture, he raised his hand in search of the nail, but the portrait gave such ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... of emigrants from fashion or caprice is probably not great; and whom shall we now dare to include under this description, when the humble artizan, the laborious peasant, and the village priest, have ensanguined the scaffold destined for the prince or the prelate?—But if the emigrants be justifiable, the ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... or degree tending next to excommunication), but also wholly cast him out of the church and deliver him to Satan. Whereupon the man being made to see the grievousness of his sin, and the terrible punishment which was to follow upon it, becometh most sorrowful, humble, and penitent. And this moved the Apostle to say, "Sufficient to such a man," &c., as if he would say, What needeth him now to be excommunicate, and so to be corrected and put to shame by you all, when every one of you shall deny to him your Christian communion, as one ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... about entering upon. She and Fanny are among the few who have ceased to notice me, except with great coldness, since my uncle's misfortunes. But I will not think of this. If they will take me, I will go even into their house, and assume the humble duties of a governess." ...
— Woman's Trials - or, Tales and Sketches from the Life around Us. • T. S. Arthur
... And that is to have the honor and glorification of introducing to you our new and worthy magistrate, Mr. Cornelius John Michael O'Crowley. (Applause) Far be it from me indeed to flatter any man, but there are times when we must tell the truth. (Applause) And when I say that there is no one more humble for a man of his achievements from here to Honolulu than Mr. O'Crowley himself, I am only telling the truth in a plain and unadorned form. Every effort put forth by Mr. O'Crowley for the welfare of mankind has been characterised ...
— Duty, and other Irish Comedies • Seumas O'Brien
... us had grown sensible enough to behave, Shelley sat on the stool, spread her fingers over the keys and played at the place father had selected, and all of us sang as hard as we could: "Be it ever so humble, There's no place like home;" and there WAS no place like ours, of THAT ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... produced in his whole life."[33] "In the present state of science," wrote Renan in 1848,[34] "nothing is wanted more urgently than a critical catalogue of the manuscripts in the different libraries ... a humble task to all appearance; ... and yet the researches of scholars are hampered and incomplete pending its definitive completion." "We should have better books on our ancient literature," says M. P. Meyer,[35] "if the predecessors ...
— Introduction to the Study of History • Charles V. Langlois
... in the fret-fulness of ungratified desire. Her family were not able to pay Gottschalk for the trouble of giving such an exclusive concert, but, to satisfy the sick girl, made the circumstances known to the artist. Gottschalk did not hesitate a moment, but ordered his piano to be conveyed to the humble abode of the patient. Here by her bedside he played for hours to the enraptured girl, and the strain of emotion was so great that her life ebbed away before he had finished the final chords. Gottschalk remained in Spain for two years, and it ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris
... liberty crowned with this inscription: "A Tribute to Virtue;" and who evinced it still more strongly a little later by sending a deputation to his death-bed to implore him before his departure from earth, to bless the humble village in which his last days had ...
— Which? - or, Between Two Women • Ernest Daudet
... for the castle of the great Earl of Mackworth. He had never appreciated before how low and narrow and poor the farm-house was. Now, with his eyes trained to the bigness of Devlen Castle, he looked around him with wonder and pity at his father's humble surroundings. He realized as he never else could have realized how great was the fall in fortune that had cast the house of Falworth down from its rightful station to such a level as that upon which it now rested. And at the same time that he thus recognized how poor ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... am the filosofo, if that I am anything!" He looked at me with great levity of eye and supernatural gravity of demeanor. "But eet ees the jealous affection of the wife, my friend, for which I make play to her with the humble leetle pouding-stone rather than the gold ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... whether or not the harm produced by these humble lotteries is sufficient to render their forcible suppression a matter of necessity. They certainly do produce an amount of indigestion which of itself must be no small penalty to pay for those whose misfortune it is to win the luxuries raffled for, but we never yet heard of any one being ruined ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... and placing them in a way of livelihood, I look upon as only what is due to a good servant, which encouragement will make his successor be as diligent, as humble, and as ready as he was. There is something wonderful in the narrowness of those minds, which can be pleased, and be barren of bounty ...
— The De Coverley Papers - From 'The Spectator' • Joseph Addison and Others
... dived into a long, dark corridor, illuminated by a single flickering gas-jet, twin brother to that which lighted the office below; and, still eager, still breathing loudly, he ushered the guest toward what in his humble soul he believed to be the luxurious, the impressive bedroom supplied by the Hotel Railleux at three francs ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... wars had bankrupted both them and the government, and the desperate expedients of the latter to raise money only increased the poverty {223} of the masses. Every estate, every province, was urged to contribute as much as possible, and most of them replied, in humble and loyal tone, but firmly, begging for relief from the ruinous exactions. The sale of offices, of justice, of collectorships of taxes, of the administration, of the army, of the public domain, was only less onerous than the sale of monopolies and inspectorships of markets and ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... Otter went and made complaint unto King Solomon, prostrating himself and saying: "Your Majesty's most humble slave craves pardon for presuming to address your Majesty, but Friend Mouse-deer has murdered your slave's children, and your slave desires to learn whether he is guilty or not according to the Law of the Land." King Solomon replied, saying, "If the Mouse-deer ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various
... sweltering waste covered the face of the globe, and huge, reptile natures held it in dominion;—who beholds the pulpy worm, down in the sea, building the pillars of continents;—so one sees the principalities of evil sliding from their thrones, and the deposits of humble faithfulness rising from the deep of ages. Our sympathy, our benevolent effort in the work of God and humanity, how much do they need not only the vision of intellectual foresight, but of the faith which, on bended knees, ...
— The Crown of Thorns - A Token for the Sorrowing • E. H. Chapin
... unacknowledged; out of the question. discontented &c. 832; unwilling &c. 603; extorted. sectarian, denominational, schismatic; heterodox; intolerant. Adv. no &c. 536; at variance, at issue with; under protest. Int. God forbid! not for the world; I'll be hanged if; never tell me; your humble servant, pardon me. Phr. many men many minds; quot homines tot sententiae [Lat][Terence]; tant s'en faut[Fr]; il s'en faut bien[Fr];no way; by no means; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... cry, "The Russians are coming," sounds through the streets of Berlin, there will be wailing and lamentation in every house and every heart; and they will bow down in timid contrition and abject obedience. Speak, therefore, to them, and say, "The Russians are coming!" that they may become humble and quiet; that the proud word may be silenced on their lips, and that they ...
— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach
... but found them entirely destitute of zeal and attachment to the royal cause, and more inclined to join the party of the rebels. He hearkened therefore very readily to a message from Henry, who entreated him not to oppose a loyal and humble supplicant in the recovery of his legal patrimony; and the guardian even declared publicly that he would second his nephew in so reasonable a request. His army embraced with acclamations the same measures; and the duke of Lancaster, reenforced by them, was now entirely master of the kingdom. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... Daniel Webster. This great American orator was born in 1782, the son of a New England farmer. He was graduated from Dartmouth College, and began the study of law. While reading Vattel, Montesquieu, and Blackstone, he eked out a humble income as a school teacher. He became associated with Christopher Gore, a noted lawyer of those days in Boston, and presently acquired a reputation as an orator. An address delivered at Fryeburg in 1802 furnished the model for his great Concord speech four ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... speculative."[11] To the Canadian commonwealth, the French population furnished a few really admirable statesmen; a dominant and loyal church; some groups of professional men, disappointed and discontented sons of humble parents, too proud to sink to the level of their uninstructed youth, and without the opportunity of rising higher; and a great mass of men who hewed wood and drew water, not for a master, but for themselves, {17} submissive to the church, and well-disposed, but ignorant, and at the ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison
... David, sadly; and he took out two letters from his bosom. "Here are two letters to the secretary. In one I accept the ship with thanks, and offer to superintend her when her rigging is being set up; and in this one I decline her altogether, with my humble and ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... not control the feelings of the auditory. He was only anxious to do his duty to the best of his humble ability, and nothing should deter him from discharging that duty freely ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... left with only the Crawfords and Mr. Yates. She had been quite overlooked by her cousins; and as her own opinion of her claims on Sir Thomas's affection was much too humble to give her any idea of classing herself with his children, she was glad to remain behind and gain a little breathing-time. Her agitation and alarm exceeded all that was endured by the rest, by the right of a disposition which not even innocence could keep from suffering. She was nearly fainting: ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... even when in Italy, namely, to be chosen a Director. Nobody dared yet to accuse him of being a deserter from the army of the East. The only difficulty was to obtain a dispensation on the score of age. And was this not to be obtained? No sooner was he installed in his humble abode in the Rue de la Victoire than he was assured that, on the retirement of Rewbell, the majority of suffrages would have devolved on him had he been in France, and had not the fundamental law required the age of forty; but that not even his warmest partisans ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, v3 • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... call Him "Our Lord," we mean the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity after He became man. He is called the "Messias" and the "Son of David" to show that He is the Redeemer promised to the Jews. Also at the end of all our litanies He is called the "Lamb of God," because He was so meek and humble and suffered death so patiently. In the Litany of the Holy Name of Jesus we will find many other beautiful names of Our Lord, all having ...
— Baltimore Catechism No. 4 (of 4) - An Explanation Of The Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine • Thomas L. Kinkead
... Caliph," answered Abdul; "permit me to express my thanks for the palace with which you have endowed your most humble servant." ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... Self-existence, are all mysteries, and eternity itself is the greatest mystery of all. There is nothing peculiar to the Trinity that is near so perplexing as eternity.' And then he finely adds: 'I know no remedy for these things but a humble mind. If we demur to a doctrine because we cannot fully and adequately comprehend it, is not this too familiar from a creature towards his Creator, and articling more strictly with Almighty God than ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... that period in which Taine and science seemed to have at last found out the physical basis of life. Now it is a new realism which appeals to us: it is the turn of the soul. The battle which the "Soirees de Medan" helped to win has been won; having gained our right to deal with humble and unpleasant and sordidly tragic things in fiction, we are free to concern ourselves with other things. But though the period has passed, and will not return, the masterpieces of the period remain. Among these masterpieces are the novels and short ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... As an humble member of the Brotherhood of Science, I desire to contribute, in however insignificant a degree, to the Great Cause of Learning. I will therefore, with Your Permission, read" (loud cries of 'No! No!' 'Put him out!' etc., to which of course I paid no attention,) "the following ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 26, September 24, 1870 • Various
... of corn holding itself very high (or a human head) you may be sure there is nothing in it. The full ear is the lowliest; the full head the most humble. ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson
... little trouble in finding our wheel-barrows; but eventually succeeding, we paid off the chair coolies, mounted our humble vehicles, and returned to the river, accompanied for fully half the distance by an attendant from the magistrate's office. Early in the evening we got back to the boats in safety, sincerely thankful to our Heavenly FATHER for His gracious protection ...
— A Retrospect • James Hudson Taylor
... Guiana or Potosi. The modern financier who makes a fortune from the invention of a collar button or the sale of countless penny packages of gum is the lineal descendant of that first thrifty New Englander who did not scorn the humble cod because it was cheap and plentiful (you remember how these same cod "pestered" the ships of Gosnold in 1602), but set to work with the quiet initiative which has distinguished New Englanders ever since, first to catch, ...
— The Old Coast Road - From Boston to Plymouth • Agnes Rothery
... moment, and the men rushed upon deck, catching up muskets and cutlasses, which always stood in readiness, as they went. The sounds proceeded from a party of about twenty Esquimaux who had been sent from the camp with the stolen property, and with a humble request that the offence might be forgiven, and their chief and his wife returned to them. They were all unarmed; and the sincerity of their repentance was further attested by the fact that they brought back, not only the hatchet and telescope, but a large assortment ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... the daughter of a great prince, thought the knight. 'It is not possible that she should remain in this humble cottage all her life. She shall be my bride, and in days to come she shall dwell in my castle of Ringstetten on ...
— Undine • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... violation of usage; and beside the stone door on the cliff side was fixed an imperishable chain by which she might in safety descend to earth. But as to what her after intentions were we had no clue. If it was that she meant to begin life again as a humble individual, there was something so noble in the thought that it even warmed my heart to her and turned my ...
— The Jewel of Seven Stars • Bram Stoker
... his humble duty to your Majesty, and being aware that your Majesty has already received the melancholy intelligence of the death of his late Majesty, will do himself the honour of waiting upon your Majesty a little before nine this morning. Viscount Melbourne has requested the Marquis of ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... produced on Jacqueline was decisive and deplorable. The poor child, after going through all the states of mind endured by those who suffer under unmerited disgrace—revolt, indignation, sulkiness, silent obstinacy— felt unable to bear it longer. She resolved to humble herself, hoping that by so doing the wall of ice that had arisen between her stepmother and herself might be cast down. By this time she cared less to know of what fault she was supposed to be guilty than to be taken back into favor as before. What must she ...
— Jacqueline, v1 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)
... "The cause of America is, in my humble opinion, the cause of the whole British empire; an empire which, from my youth, I have been taught to love and revere, as founded in the principles of natural reason and justice, and upon the whole, best calculated for ...
— James Otis The Pre-Revolutionist • John Clark Ridpath
... shield-bearer: who holds over his head a shield of cowhide - in shape like an immense mussel shell - fearfully and wonderfully, after the manner of a theatrical supernumerary. But lest the great man should forget his greatness in the contemplation of the humble works of agriculture, there suddenly rushes in a poet, retained for the purpose, called a Praiser. This literary gentleman wears a leopard's head over his own, and a dress of tigers' tails; he has the appearance of having come ...
— Reprinted Pieces • Charles Dickens
... that, mother.' Herbert was right. He had seen, one of humble pretensions, but of unbounded worth, for whom he began to feel already a more than ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... Michael, the Huguenots having suddenly risen in all parts of France, Conde and Coligny, at the head of the troops of the neighboring provinces, were to present themselves at the court, which would be busy celebrating the customary annual ceremonial of the royal order. They would then hand to the king a humble petition for the redress of grievances, for the removal of the Cardinal of Lorraine, and for the dispersion of the Swiss troops, which, instead of being retained near the frontiers of the kingdom which they had ostensibly come to protect, had been advanced to the very vicinity of the capital.[433] ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... the low call of the sea filling the humble little room, he turned round to the girl, who stood with her head bent, ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... similar verses do not speak Mr. Moore's political sentiments, then undoubtedly he has never written, or at least published any thing relating to public affairs; and Lord Byron has no kind of pretence for talking of the political character and public principles of an humble individual who is only known as the translator of Anacreon, and the writer, composer, and singer of certain songs, which songs do not (ex-hypothesi) speak the sentiments even of ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... out of the sail, for a winding-sheet. . . . But the pot was near to boiling; and after we had supped on the crayfish and the fruit, he fell to work again, nailing together a rough coffin. He explained that he had served his time in quite a humble way before embarking in business, on borrowed capital, as a tradesman. Then, under the risen moon, by the scarcely audible plash of the beach, he told me quite a lot about himself and his early days, as he fashioned ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Christianity is producing; but he would attempt no sudden or majestic reforms. Cake and ale would still be popular, and ginger be hot in the mouth, let him preach ever so—let him be never so solemn a hermit; but a bright face, a true trusting heart, a strong arm, and an humble mind, might do much in teaching those around him that men may be gay and yet not profligate, that women may be devout and yet not dead to ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... historical reference to Babaji need not surprise us. The great guru has never openly appeared in any century; the misinterpreting glare of publicity has no place in his millennial plans. Like the Creator, the sole but silent Power, Babaji works in a humble obscurity. ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... expression of their firm belief that he had been unfortunately misinformed as to those sentiments of affection and respect which his excellency the Prefect was well known to entertain towards him. They ventured, therefore, to express a humble hope that, by some mutual compromise, to define which would be an unwarrantable intrusion on their part, a happy reconciliation would be effected, and the stability of law, property, and the Catholic Faith ensured. All which Orestes heard with blandest ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... pursuance of his host's instructions strove manfully to subdue feelings towards Miss Rose by no means in accordance with them. The best of us are liable to absent-mindedness, and he sometimes so far forgot himself as to address her in tones as humble as any in her ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... Ger. knechtisch means servile. The degeneration of words like boor,[60] churl, farmer, is a familiar phenomenon (cf. villain, p. 150). The same thing has happened to blackguard, the modern meaning of which bears hardly on a humble but useful class. The name black guard was given collectively to the kitchen detachment of a great man's retinue. The scavenger has also come down in the world, rather an unusual phenomenon in the case of ...
— The Romance of Words (4th ed.) • Ernest Weekley
... entered as a student in the Temple, and recommended him to the superintendence of some person who knew the town, and might engage him insensibly in such amusements and connexions, as would soon lift his ideas above the humble objects on which they ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... expurgated, furnished the scenarios of a score of the most successful legitimate dramas and comedies of recent years. Some of our greatest legitimate and vaudeville performers also came from this humble and not-to-be-boasted-of school. This phase of the growth of the American drama has never been written. It should be recorded while the memories of "old timers" are ...
— Writing for Vaudeville • Brett Page
... Spaniard was surprised to see the son of his Britannic majesty acting in the capacity of an inferior officer, and emphatically observed to Admiral Digby, "Well does Great Britain merit the empire of the seas, when humble stations in her navy are filled by ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - No. 291 - Supplement to Vol 10 • Various
... opprobrious term b—, and the word damnation, which he repeated with surprising volubility, without any sort of propriety or connection; and retreated into his penetralia, leaving the baffled devotee in the humble posture she had so unsuccessfully chosen to ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... of him in the spoon-bowl of their own elongated narrowness; Mrs. Sclater saw the possible gentleman through the loop-hole of a compliment he had paid her; and Mr. Sclater beheld only the minimum which the reversed telescope of his own enlarged importance, he having himself come of sufficiently humble origin, made of him; while Ginevra looked up to him more as one who marvelled at the grandly unintelligible, than one who understood the relations and proportions of what she beheld. Nor was it possible she could help feeling that he was a more harmonious object ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... thing that the life of these humble friends, of these inferior brethren, should not be proportionate to that ...
— My Private Menagerie - from The Works of Theophile Gautier Volume 19 • Theophile Gautier
... you are wont To think the simple truth too blunt, The fabulous may less affront; Which now, inspired with gratitude, Yea, kindled into zeal most fervent, Doth venture to intrude Within your maiden solitude, And kneel, your humble servant.— In times when animals were speakers, Among the quadrupedal seekers Of our alliance There came the lions. And wherefore not? for then They yielded not to men In point of courage or of sense, ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... of power. The principle of degrees assures us that such changed levels of consciousness and angles of approach may well involve introduction into a universe of new relations, which we are not competent to criticize.[35] This is a truth which should make us humble in our efforts to understand the difficult and too often paradoxical utterances of religious genius. It suggests the puzzlings of philosophers and theologians—and, I may add, of psychologists too—over experiences which they ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill
... she had forgiven her lord, the shattering of their union was the cost of forgiveness. In letting him stand high, as the lofty man she had originally worshipped, she separated herself from him, to feel that the humble she was of a different element, as a running water at a mountain's base. They are one in the landscape; they are far from one in reality. Aminta's pride of being chafed ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... whose doom had been pronounced, a second time threw himself upon the ground, and crawled to the feet of the leader in humble supplication for mercy. He shed tears, and vowed that if his life was spared, he would steal with renewed energy, and be more faithful than ever; and for a while I thought the chief would relent, but during a moment's pause, I distinctly ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... mention of potatoes Uncle Bernard could not help grimacing; he remembered, with the longing of affection, old Berbel's good suppers, and had a difficulty in coming down to the humble realities before him. ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian
... with tears, her proud loveliness grew humble, and, a supplicant, she stretched out her arms to me: she cried, "Ah, you love me not: you have no pity. I may live and die here: you will not save me. You are strong as the lions are—you are so strong, and yet you ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... It seems as though there were indeed evil tidings in store for me. The blight of anticipated evil even weighed upon me ere I passed yonder hall, and when I knew no reason why I should not find you loving of heart and humble of desire as in other days. Is it all gone? Are you no longer the same? This tawdry velvet in which I found you arrayed—is it the type of a something equally foreign to your nature, and which ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... his inspiration; it came to him directly, honestly in the light of his day, not on the tortuous, dark roads of meditation. His realities came to him from a genuine source, from this universe of vain appearances wherein we men have found everything to make us proud, sorry, exalted, and humble. ...
— Notes on Life and Letters • Joseph Conrad
... of those shots I spoke of-which the perpetrator accepts with a thankful and humble spirit. The sing-sing leaped high in the air and plunged over the edge of the bench. I signalled the camp-in plain sight-to come and get the head and meat, and sat down to wait. And while waiting, I looked out on a scene that has since been to me one ...
— The Land of Footprints • Stewart Edward White
... youth with a flash of spirit, "at least he never stripped the peaceful homestead and humble farmer, like the ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... and consummate knowledge of the mechanical arts, and it is the object of the following pages to assist the young physicist in making his first steps towards acquiring a working knowledge of "laboratory arts." However humble the ambition may be, no one can be more keenly alive than the writer to the inadequacy of his attempt; and it is only from a profound sense of the necessity which exists for some beginning to be made, that he has had the courage to air his views on matters ...
— On Laboratory Arts • Richard Threlfall
... side of the Court of Lions, is the Hall of the Abencerrages; so called from the gallant cavaliers of that illustrious line who were here perfidiously massacred. There are some who doubt the whole truth of this story; but our humble attendant Mateo pointed out the very wicket of the portal through which they are said to have been introduced, one by one, and the white marble fountain in the centre of the hall where they were ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 19, - Issue 549 (Supplementary issue) • Various
... the new subject that Uncle Charles was laying in. He explained it to her, well knowing that he spoke to unsympathetic ears, for whatever Doris might draw for her publishers, she was a passionate and humble follower of those modern experimentalists who have made the Slade School famous. The subject was, it seemed, to be a visit paid to Joanna the mad and widowed mother of Charles V., at Tordesillas, by the envoys ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... guest exclaimed, "before you were born, as a British merchant, I sold thousands of pounds worth of West India goods; and should now, if I had my rights, be in possession of a princely fortune. Do not think that I am speaking boastingly, for I am humble. All pride, excepting the love of honesty, and a desire to see my family once more in comfortable circumstances, has left me; and now I labor for love of my children, at whatever business I ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... nature of the task proposed is couched assistance, since thus to the breath of the flowers does association lend its own interpretation, driving deep the sharpest stings or dropping down the richest consolation through the most humble plants. But is this the end of the matter? Is there not, apart from all that our personal interest may discover, in each flower an unchanging address all its own—an unvaried salutation proffered ever to the world at large? Why is a passion wafted through a nosegay? What purifies the air ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... bitterness and loathing, as forever to discourage me, young and feeling as I am, from loving." I then told her, without concealment, as I would have spoken before Heaven, of all that could interest her in my life. I related my birth, my humble and poor condition; I spoke of my father, a soldier of former days; my mother, a woman of exquisite sensibility, whose youth had been passed in all the refinement and elegance of letters; my young sisters, their pious and angelic ...
— Raphael - Pages Of The Book Of Life At Twenty • Alphonse de Lamartine
... publications." I have in my hand a little book, which those of you who are at a great distance may have some difficulty in seeing, and which I value very much. It is, I am afraid, sadly thumbed and scratched with annotations by a very humble successor and follower of Harvey. This little book is the edition of 1651 of the 'Exercitationes de Generatione'; and if you were to add another little book, printed in the same small type, and about one-seventh of the thickness, you would have the sum total of the printed matter which Harvey ...
— Lectures and Essays • T.H. Huxley
... justice, in which D'Espresmenil struck the first blow at royalty—He was exiled to the Ile de St. Marguerite—After having stirred up all the parliaments against the royal authority, he again became the humble servant of the crown—After the revolution, the Palais de Justice was the seat of the Revolutionary Tribunal—Dumas, its president, proposed to assemble there five or six hundred victims at a time—He was the next day condemned to death by the same tribunal—The Palais ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... packages from the downtown shops were to leave their goods and get their receipts; here the laundryman was to wait every Monday morning while Adah gathered up my hebdomadal bundle of linen for the wash; here were the children to gather for a frolic every evening after the humble vesper meal. ...
— The House - An Episode in the Lives of Reuben Baker, Astronomer, and of His Wife, Alice • Eugene Field
... youngster, in full gala dress for the theatre, drawing on his gloves, and hurrying Mr. Stewart, is, dear reader, your most humble, devoted, and obedient servant, Frank Byrne, alias, myself, alias, the ship's cousin, alias, the son of the ship's owner. Supposing, of course, that you believe in Mesmerism and clairvoyance, I shall not stop to explain how I have been ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... the hole of the bumble-bee. Weary with culling sweets from the lime-trees, the heather-bloom, the apple-blossom and the ivy-flower be had sought his humble couch. Suddenly great claws tear away his roof-tree. Red Head is at work. Bees and honey make his ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, June 17, 1914 • Various
... these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most Not altered. humble terms; our repeated petitions have been answered only ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... him at a distance, the casual observer would at once have judged him to be either an athlete or an ascetic. There was no superfluous flesh about him; he was tall and muscular, with well- knit limbs, broad shoulders, and a head altogether lacking in the humble or conciliatory 'droop' which all worldly-wise parsons cultivate for the benefit of their rich patrons. It was a distinctively proud head,—almost aggressive,—indicative of strong character and self-reliance, well-poised on a full throat, and set off by a considerable ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... so much at their case, and feel that they are wisely discursive?—But if we pursue this idea, it will be scarcely possible to avoid something which might look like self-praise; and we content ourselves for the present with expressing our humble conviction that we are doing a service to writers and readers, by calling forth materials which they have themselves thought worth notice, but which, for want of elaboration, and the "little leisure" that has not yet come, are lying, and may lie for ever, unnoticed ...
— Notes And Queries,(Series 1, Vol. 2, Issue 1), - Saturday, November 3, 1849. • Various
... with his wife, who, though born to a far higher social position in which simplicity is rarer, was, like him, true and humble and strong. They had one daughter, who grew up only to die: the moment they saw Kirsty, their hearts went out ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald
... with the utmost gentleness raising them slowly to the surface. Though stationary, they kept up a constant sculling or waving motion with their fins, which is exceedingly graceful, and expressive of their humble happiness; for unlike ours, the element in which they live is a stream which must be constantly resisted. From time to time they nibble the weeds at the bottom or overhanging their nests, or dart after a fly or worm. The dorsal fin, besides answering the purpose of a keel, ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe |
