"Ignorant" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... thence he sent to Quebec, summoning Champlain to surrender. The brave governor consulted with Pontgrave and the inhabitants; they came to the resolution of attempting a defense, although reduced to great extremities, and sent Kertk such a spirited answer that he, ignorant of their weakness, did not advance upon the town. He, however, captured a convoy under the charge of De Roquemont, with several families on board, and a large supply of provisions for the settlement. This ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... vigilance and activity of Mr. Warren, one of the bravest and best officers in the service of England. The operations of the siege were wholly conducted by the engineers and officers who commanded the British marines; and the Americans, being ignorant of war, were contented to act under their directions. The town being considerably damaged by the bombs and bullets of the besiegers, and the garrison despairing of relief, the governor capitulated on the seventeenth day of June, when the city of Louisbourg, and the isle of Cape Breton, were surrendered ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... the room," said Mrs. Van Vechten, pointing toward Rosamond, who, wholly ignorant of the nature of her offence, retreated hastily, wondering how she ...
— Rosamond - or, The Youthful Error • Mary J. Holmes
... praises and some of them will stick.'... It will stick with the more ignorant and the populace, though men of wisdom may smile at it; and the reputation won with many will amply countervail the disdain of a few.... And surely no small number of those who are of solid nature, and who, from the want of this ventosity, cannot spread all sail ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 1 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... now no interest for her. The last news from Pisa that had appealed to her sympathies was the news of the Countess d'Ascoli's death, and of Fabio's departure to travel in foreign countries. Since then she had heard nothing more of him. She was as ignorant of his return to his native city as of all the reports connected with the marquis's ball. Something in her own heart—some feeling which she had neither the desire nor the capacity to analyze—had brought ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... Philip (now persuaded that the Beauforts were ignorant of his brother's fate) had set Mr. Barlow's activity in search of Sidney; and his painful anxiety to discover one so dear and so mysteriously lost was the only cause of uneasiness apparent in the brightening ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 5 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... to spread sweetness and light, and to the end, furthermore, that the ignorant people across the salted seas might know something of a land of real food and much food, and plenty of it and plenty of variety to it, I would that I might bring an expedition of Europeans to America and personally conduct ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... dining-room, folded his paper and said: 'You know, Miss Buchanan, that Thomas, though a nice fellow, is remarkably ignorant. I can't make out that there's anything of a civic or national nature that he's interested in. He doesn't seem to read anything in the papers except the racing and betting news. He doesn't seem to feel that he has any stake in this great country of ...
— Franklin Kane • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... had I been ignorant of his lordship's person,' said Mr Haredale. 'I hope there is but one gentleman in England who, addressing an ignorant and excited throng, would speak of a large body of his fellow-subjects in such injurious language as I heard this moment. For shame, ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... her daughter to be married to the man privately, as if she was ignorant of the whole affair, and then pretending that it has come to her knowledge, she may give her ...
— The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana - Translated From The Sanscrit In Seven Parts With Preface, - Introduction and Concluding Remarks • Vatsyayana
... colony from Marseilles; and As'ta, Asti. The Ligurians were one of the last Italian states conquered by the Romans; on account of their inveterate hostility, they are grossly maligned by the historians of the victorious people, and described as ignorant, treacherous, and deceitful; but the Greek writers have given a different and more impartial account; they assure us that the Ligurians were eminent for boldness and dexterity, and at the same time patient ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... shrines where marble statues weep blood, and cataliptic galls let flies walk over their eyes without winking, and yet imprisons an English lady for giving away the 'Pilgrim's Progress.' It's very wrong, no doubt, but it ain't very new after all. Ignorant and bigoted people always have persecuted, and always will to the end of the chapter. But what was to be done with his high mightiness, the Dutch governor? Well, they decided that it was not lawful to put him into the ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... hours at least, but that the little bell had only gone four times. Twice or thrice he looked angrily and impatiently round; but there was Sir Mulberry in the same attitude, putting his glass to his lips from time to time, and looking vacantly at the wall, as if he were wholly ignorant of the presence ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... that, Miss Jordan? You seen Jud Hopkin's roan go by them fancy Coles mares? Well, well, it done my heart good! This gent Coles comes out of the East to teach us poor ignorant ranchers what right hoss flesh should be. He's going to auction off them half dozen mares after the race. Well, sir, I wouldn't give fifty dollars a head for 'em. Nor neither will nobody else when they see them mares fade away in the home stretch; ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... attempt to get fresh water at this island, but as we were ignorant of the landing-place, where we found many inconveniences and disadvantages, we were unable to effect our purpose. Wherefore we departed on the night of the 25th October for the island of St George, in quest of fresh water, and got there on the 27th. Observing a stream ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... of their rapid talk escaped an ear trained to faintest noises in the woods. I felt like a tree, well set up and sound, but rooted and voiceless in my ignorant helplessness before the two so frankly ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... artfully raised, that porter requires to be brewed in large quantities, and to be long stored, to render it sound and strong; but experience will prove the falsehood of these prejudices, which have their origin with the ignorant, and are cherished by the interested. One brewing under another will afford ample time for porter to refine for use, and every person can best judge of the extent of his own consumption. Porter is not the better for being ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton
... never mentioned to you the storming of Java. Fill yourself another glass, and I'll describe it all to you, for it will be of infinite consequence that a true narrative of this meets the public eye —they really are quire ignorant of it. Here now is Fort Cornelius, and there is the moat, the sugar-basin is the citadel, and the tongs is the first trench, the decanter will represent the tall tower towards the south-west angle, and here, the wine glass—this is me. Well, it was a little after ten at night that ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... washing glass, Handling the engine, turning taps for tots, And countering change, and scorning what men say, Of posing as a dove among the pots, Nor often gives her dignity away. Her head's a work of art, and, if her eyes Be tired and ignorant, she has a waist; Cheaply the Mode she shadows; and she tries From penny novels to amend her taste; And, having mopped the zinc for certain years, And faced the gas, she fades and disappears. The Artist muses at his ease, ...
— Hawthorn and Lavender - with Other Verses • William Ernest Henley
... apparently much excited, in quest of the "lost or stolen." Soon, however, he was upon the track; he scented it to the gentleman's coat pocket. What was to be done? The dog had no means of asking verbally for it, and was not accustomed to picking pockets; and, besides, the gentleman was ignorant of his business with him. But Tiger's sagacity did not suffer him to remain long in suspense; he seized the skirt containing the prize, and furiously tore it from the coat, and hastily made off with it, much to the surprise of its ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... "I know." Ignorant of that earlier past of hers, in which Eliot Coventry had played a part, he was thinking only of her unhappy married life, about which he had gathered a good deal from other people and a little—a very little—from Cara herself. But even that little had let in far more light than she had imagined. ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... later,—even a year later—and Mary Virginia could never have written those letters. But now, very ignorant, very innocent, very impassioned, she accomplished a miracle. She was like one speaking an unknown tongue, perfectly sure that the spirit moved her, but quite unable to comprehend what it was that it ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler
... had continually no other idea of his visitor than that he was insufferable. He had confessed to Abel that the old man was shrewd. His shrewdness was a proverb. But he is a dull, ignorant, ungrammatical, and ridiculous old ass for all that, thought Boniface Newt; and the said ass sitting in Boniface Newt's counting-room, and amusing and fatiguing Messrs. Newt & Son with his sez I's, and sez shes, and his mas, and his done its, was quietly making up his mind that the house of ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... probability approaches unity that any more such ignorant meddling as this obnoxious Tuly did well result almost certainly in failure and death. Therefore we can not and will not ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith
... For these ignorant and benighted savages they had left their homes and given up all that life ordinarily means and offers. Were they to be allowed to drift back into ...
— The Old Franciscan Missions Of California • George Wharton James
... Mrs. Pelser; ill and concerned about soul; same one I had long talks with before; afraid she is still ignorant of primary step, reconciliation with God; spent long while in making way of salvation clear; Doppers; tent full; "Haar Leuze" (her delight), Psalm 62, verse 1, and when I read it aloud I was on the point of remarking, "Nee, wach, ik ...
— Woman's Endurance • A.D.L.
... sufficient knowledge on our part, could be explained and justified. The pine-tree and the orchid are not friends by accident, however the case may look to us who cannot see behind the present nor beneath the surface. There are no mysteries per se, but only to the ignorant. Yet ignorance itself, disparagingly as we talk of it, has its favorable side,—as it is pleasant sometimes to withdraw from the sun and wander for a season in the half-light of the forest. Perhaps we need be in no haste ...
— The Foot-path Way • Bradford Torrey
... must be the tradition my mother meant, when she said, 'There is a tradition.' Yes, her trunk is pointing to it." So he pulled up the birch tree and devoured it, as well as he could. The young Elephant continued to wander among the mountains but with no great purpose in life; for he was totally ignorant of the story that one of his race would one day mount to the sky and dwell among the stars, so that he was without that great object before him. Neither did he know how much suffering his father and mother had gone through, that ...
— Seven Little People and their Friends • Horace Elisha Scudder
... parliament, and the manifest growth of sympathy for the Americans in his metropolis, the king was desirous of making honorable concessions. Foolish ministers and ignorant and knavish politicians prated of British honor, and advised the adoption of rigorous measures for throwing back the swelling tide of rebellion in America. It was an easy thing to advise, but difficult ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... Difficult, nay, utterly impossible, as he will find it, to combine a competent acquisition of useful knowledge with that round of antiquated studies which a pursuit of scholastic honours requires, he must either, by devoting the whole of his attention and ambition to the latter object, remain ignorant on most of those subjects upon which mind grapples with mind in life, or by adopting, as Lord Byron and other distinguished persons have done, the contrary system, consent to pass for a dunce or idler in the schools, ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... More, "father, drinker runaway from the Augustinian Order, clumsy tipsy reveller of the worldly and spiritual kingdoms, ignorant ...
— Historical Miniatures • August Strindberg
... with me, together with many others, Crocus, most beloved of me. As for those which are come from Syria, and are gone before me to Rome, to the glory of God, I suppose you are not ignorant of them. ...
— The Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete • Archbishop Wake
... long time. When I awoke I heard sounds in the distance, and knew that people were moving. Here in these caverns there was no difference between day and night, but, by modes of which I was ignorant, a regular succession was observed of waking times and ...
— A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder • James De Mille
... heat, with that glow on their faces? It made me afraid—afraid that they'll wake up some day, and then they will be terrible. I thought of the children. It seems not only wicked, but mad to bring ignorant foreigners over here and make them slaves like that, and so many of them are hurt and maimed. I can't ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... to the scandal of all France, to bring an accusation against myself. They examined my papers, they interrogated me, they made me sign myself guilty, and ask the King's pardon for a fault of which I was ignorant; and I owed to the devotion, and the perhaps eternal imprisonment of a faithful servant, the preservation of this casket which you have saved for me. I read in your looks that you think me too fearful; but do not deceive yourself, as all the court now does. Be sure, my dear child, that this man ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... Parisians have until now lived in an ideal world of their own creation. Their orators, their statesmen, and their journalists, have traded upon the traditions of the First Empire, and persuaded them that they are a superior race, and that their superiority is universally recognised. Utterly ignorant of foreign languages and of foreign countries, they believe that their literature is the only one in the world, and that a Frenchman abroad is adored as something little less than a divinity. They regard the Prussians round their ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... at all times, like Lucan's dark face, a sort of sculptural firmness. It was, therefore, rather difficult to read upon it the impressions of a soul which was naturally strong and self-controlling. On one point, however, that soul had become weak. Monsieur de Lucan was not ignorant of the fact; he was aware of the count's ardent love for Julia, and of the sickly ...
— Led Astray and The Sphinx - Two Novellas In One Volume • Octave Feuillet
... from general experience: for instance, all facts or phenomena which come to us through our senses as phenomena, but of the causes of which we are ignorant. ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... his guests. They, however, as long as his supply of liquor and provisions lasted, would be content to remain where they were. He had no wish to bring his son among them, for bad as he himself was, he had, since the loss of his youngest boy, kept his other two children ignorant of his mode of life, though it was possible that the eldest might have suspected it from circumstances which he must have remembered in ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... ideographic characters, they could understand each other's writing but not speech.] In reply to questions the interpreter is represented as having described his friends the foreigners as being ignorant of etiquette and characters, of the use of wine cups and chop sticks, and as being, in fact, little better than the beasts of the field. The chief of the foreigners taught Tokitada the use of firearms, and upon leaving presented him with three guns and ammunition, which were forwarded to ...
— Japan • David Murray
... had broken in to his house, and had borne away all that he hadde. These tidinges greued him so sore, that all hevy and sorowefullye he rose vp and wente his waye. Whan the felowe sawe him do so, he sayde: O thou folissh and madde man, goest thou aboute to dyuine other mennes matters, and arte ignorant in thine owne? ...
— Shakespeare Jest-Books; - Reprints of the Early and Very Rare Jest-Books Supposed - to Have Been Used by Shakespeare • Unknown
... need sleep against the toil of to-morrow. Let every man who wants to do so sleep an hour or two later in the morning. Men of the A., G. & N. M., accept my heartiest thanks for the splendid manner in which you turned out to help me, though as yet I'm ignorant of how ...
— The Young Engineers in Arizona - Laying Tracks on the Man-killer Quicksand • H. Irving Hancock
... appeared not to have been opened in my absence. They went to Judith's apartment. They found her asleep and in safety. Pleyel's caution induced him to forbear alarming the girl; and finding her wholly ignorant of what had passed, they directed her to return to her chamber. They then fastened the ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... Nan, warmly, 'every one knows that it's those who are most ignorant of boats who are most reckless in them. It's very easy to be brave if you're stupidly ignorant. I know papa used to say it was always the most experienced sportsman who took most care about unloading his gun on going into a house. Why, if you're walking along the pier, ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... was with my masters at college, and wherewith it seemed to me that I had somewhat improved my mind; and I determined to make use of them as occasion should arise, as if I knew how to talk, but in a different manner from that practised by some ignorant persons, who interlard their conversation with Latin apophthegms, giving those who do not understand them to believe that they are great Latinists, whereas they can hardly decline a noun or conjugate ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... eyes,—"methinks you take over much upon yourself in this our land of liberty and God-given rights. Why should you decide so absolutely for Mistress Standish? Why may not she speak her own mind. She at least has no narrow and ignorant prejudice against me, unless indeed you have already instilled it into ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... all yet: there was in her a great leaning to poetic utterance generally, and that arising from a poetic habit of thought. She had in her everything essential to the making of a poetess; yet of the whole she was profoundly ignorant; and had any one sought to develop the general gift, I believe all would have shrunk back ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... a rival and waited for his next works with the hope of a failure; the old men who lived far from their fatherland examined him with malignant curiosity. "And so that big chap was the blacksmith's son, who caused so much disturbance among the ignorant people at home!... Madrid was not Rome. They would soon see what that genius ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... very helpless, very ignorant," she said, "even the worst of us. And I doubt if in all our lives we are capable of the harm that one man refrains from doing for an hour.... And that, I think, is our only compensation.... What theirs may be I do not ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... diligence, he is able by an appeal to their common humanity to prevail with the witness to spare him the revolting publicity which it must be confessed would once have followed his discovery; the right hand which is full to overflowing is now as skilled as the empty right hand in keeping the left hand ignorant of its doings. This has happened through the general decay of snobbishness among us, perhaps. It is certain that there is no longer the passion for a knowledge of the rich, and the smart, which made us ridiculous to Mr. Homos. Ten or ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells
... Lapped, took in her lap, Large, generous, Largeness, liberality, Laton, latten, brass, Laund, waste plain, Layne, conceal, Lazar-cot, leper-house, Learn, teach, Lears, cheeks, Leaved, leafy, Lecher, fornicator, Leech, physician, Leman, lover, Let, caused to, Let, hinder, Lewdest, most ignorant, Licours lecherous, Lief, dear, Liefer, more gladly, Lieve, believe, Limb-meal, limb from limb, List, desire, pleasure, Lithe, joint, Longing unto, belonging to, Long on (upon), because of, Loos, praise, Lotless, without a share, Loveday, day for. settling disputes, Loving, ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume II (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... the myths and traditions of different countries, they look now here, now there, for the original. But it was not in any land but out of the Christ-Soul of the universe that true wisdom at all times was begotten. Some ignorant peasant, some Jacob Boehme, is pure and aspires, and lo! the God stirs within him and he knows the things that were taught in elder days and by unknown people. Our own land, long ago, had its Initiates in whom the eye of the seer was open. This eye, concealed in the hollow of the brain, is the ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... supports my mind, and even preserves my senses, in deep calamity, I ran over the letter, which was dated the fourth day after the wound, and acknowledged that three incisions had been made in the leg unnecessarily by an ignorant surgeon, which had so aggravated the danger, as well as the suffering, that he was now in bed, not only from the pain of the lacerated limb, but also from a nervous fever! and that no hope was held Out to him of quitting it ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... justified the character of good temper given him by Horace Walpole. His attitude towards the Acadians remained on the whole patient and conciliatory. "My friends," he replied to a deputation of them asking a general permission to leave the province, "I am not ignorant of the fact that every means has been used to alienate the hearts of the French subjects of His Britannic Majesty. Great advantages have been promised you elsewhere, and you have been made to imagine that your ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... his prudence and character in the world would not allow him to think of by the other: and as absence seemed to him the best remedy, he sent her down into the country again with a precipitation, which made her (wholly ignorant of the real motive) fear she had done something to offend him. At parting, she entreated him to let her know if he had been dissatisfied with any thing in her behaviour.—Wherefore do you ask? said he, with some emotion, which the poor innocent still mistook for displeasure; because, answered ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... copper gates. They carried staves, such as messengers bear in those lands, and seemed sombrely clad when the dancers all came round them with their green and lilac dresses. Those Europeans who were present and heard the message given were ignorant of the language, and only caught the name of Utnar Vehi. But it was brief, and passed rapidly from mouth to mouth, and almost at once the people burnt their vineyards and began to flee away from Bethmoora, going for the most part northwards, ...
— A Dreamer's Tales • Lord Dunsany [Edward J. M. D. Plunkett]
... only the exchange of Glaucus and Diomed, gold for brass; to disfranchise them, confiscate their estates, and place them under the political control of the freedmen, lately their slaves, and the ignorant and miserable "white trash," would be simply to render rebellion chronic, and to convert seven millions of Americans, willing and anxious to be free, loyal American citizens, eternal enemies. They have yielded to superior numbers and resources; beaten, but not ...
— The American Republic: Its Constitution, Tendencies, and Destiny • A. O. Brownson
... advisors of the corporations of that region. I said that I had met a great many lawyers from whom the complaint had come most vigorously, not only that there was too much legislation with regard to corporations, but that it was ignorant legislation. I said, "Now, the responsibility is with you. If the legislation is mistaken, you are on the inside and know where the mistakes are being made. You know not only the innocent and right ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson
... to impart suspicion. Men are prone to believe evil of each other; and Paul was destined to realize this. The hotel servants, ignorant and suspicious, ...
— Paul the Peddler - The Fortunes of a Young Street Merchant • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... shape that I never got used to for all the years I was kept at it—school. For the life of me I can't see what use it was to me or to anyone else. What does a child learn at school that's of any use to him? You'll think I am talking like an ignorant fool, I dare say, but hear me out. Between eight and seventeen I went to six different schools. The country in those days was spotted with them. Some were called colleges, some academies, one was called ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... think I should swim away every time I saw you coming. But as I only stop here for a day or two twice a year, I guess I can stand it. Besides, you really ought to know something about some of the people who live in the Great Forest. It is shameful, Peter, that you should be so ignorant. And so if you will promise not to ask for another story while I am here, I will tell you about ...
— Mother West Wind "Where" Stories • Thornton W. Burgess
... of a 'certain class,' a Mme. de Crecy, whom Mme. Verdurin called by her Christian name, Odette, and pronounced a 'love,' and to the pianist's aunt, who looked as though she had, at one period, 'answered the bell': ladies quite ignorant of the world, who in their social simplicity were so easily led to believe that the Princesse de Sagan and the Duchesse de Guermantes were obliged to pay large sums of money to other poor wretches, in ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... we know nothing; and of her personal antecedents we are almost entirely ignorant. Our only information concerning such matters comes from Jean d'Aulon, who, on the evidence of several women, states[2750] that she was never fully developed, a condition which ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... right in her estimate of their flattery. Astonished at her lavish generosity, and ignorant of her great wealth, which made alms-giving easy, her poor neighbors put their old heads together to find out the solution of the problem. And they came to the conclusion that this lady must have been a great sinner, whose husband had abandoned her ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... the people of ancient Europe, they were the most adventurous and intrepid. They established a dynasty in Russia; they cut their way through a perfidious and sanguinary nation to Constantinople; they landed on the coasts of England and France, and surprised nations who were ignorant of their existence; they conquered Sicily, and established a principality in the heart of Syria. A people so active, so enterprising, and so intrepid, found no greater delight in their leisure hours than listening to tales of adventures, dangers, and battles. The romances ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... all of those who have been stimulated by the new freedom of speech to thrust themselves forward as teachers of sex hygiene, and as social reformers, are safe leaders. Some are ignorant and unaware that enthusiasm is not a satisfactory substitute for knowledge. Some are hysterical. At a recent purity convention, a woman said, "I know little about the facts, but it is wonderful how much ignorance can accomplish when accompanied by devotion and persistence." That declaration ...
— The Social Emergency - Studies in Sex Hygiene and Morals • Various
... the crowd were producing a manifest effect, I sternly assumed the captain, and ordered the boat to be pushed off into the stream. A shower of curses followed me from the shore; but the Negroes under me, accustomed to obey, and, alas! too degraded and ignorant of the advantages of liberty to know what they were forfeiting, offered no resistance to my command." "Often since that day," says he, "has my soul been pierced with bitter anguish at the thought of having been thus instrumental in consigning ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... the burden. But, for the time being, we have had to maintain our standing chiefly by making continued reductions of expenditures. This has been a difficult and sorrowful task. In answer to numberless appeals in behalf of the ignorant and suffering, we have had to explain constantly that the refusals of the Association were due, not to lack of sympathy, but to lack of means. In general, the Association can administer only the means confided ...
— American Missionary - Volume 50, No. 9, September, 1896 • Various
... consider next the question what is implied by saying that a person "understands" a word, in the sense in which one understands a word in one's own language, but not in a language of which one is ignorant. We may say that a person understands a word when (a) suitable circumstances make him use it, (b) the hearing of it causes suitable behaviour in him. We may call these two active and passive understanding respectively. Dogs often have passive understanding of some words, but not active understanding, ...
— The Analysis of Mind • Bertrand Russell
... Feeling a little ignorant of just what the law was in the case, Cap'n Sproul chose to make his directions vague and his facial expression unmistakable, and he backed out, bending impartial and baleful stare on the ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... of about 16 who mysteriously appeared in Nuernberg one day in 1828, was found to be as helpless and ignorant as a baby, and held a letter in his hand giving an account of his history. The mystery of his case interested Lord Stanhope, who charged himself with the care of him, but he was enticed out of the house he was boarded in one day, returned mortally ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... to go home that evening, would have, probably, for he was not ignorant of where he was drifting. But when he went back to the office Nina was on the wire, with the news that they were to go with a party ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... was angry that the woman should have so cleverly made the acquaintance of the girl. It showed him plainly that Benton and she were working on a set and desperate plan, while the girl before him was entirely ignorant of ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... went on, "It's not your fault, Theodore, that you have had no schooling, thus far, but now, you can go to an evening school and it will be your fault if you grow up ignorant. You will be able to do far more and better work in the world, with an education, than without one. The more you know yourself the better you can ...
— The Bishop's Shadow • I. T. Thurston
... freedom of trade to Ireland, consistently with the interests of this kingdom. Even when the session opened, Lord North declared that he did not know what remedy to apply to a disease of the cause of which he was ignorant; and ministry not being then entirely resolved how far they should submit to your energy, they, by anticipation, set the above author or some of his associates to fill the newspapers with invectives against ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... came here first it was in a hired wagon, and Hottentot drivers: so when we came to settle I made ready for a bit of a wrangle. But my maid Sophy, that is nurse now, and a great despiser of heathens, she says, 'Don't you trouble; them nasty ignorant blacks never charges more than their due.' 'I forgive 'em,' says I; 'I wish all white folk was as nice.' However, I did give them a trifle over, for luck: and then they got together and chattered something near the door, hand in hand. 'La, Sophy,' says I, 'what ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... nothing of this religion but its beauty and truth. It is what I have ever longed for, and now that I possess it I value it far more than life. But,'—he paused a moment—'I have mingled but little with this people; I know scarcely any; I am ignorant of what they require of those who belong to their number in such emergences. I am ready to die myself, rather than shrink from a bold acknowledgment of what in my heart I believe to be the divinest truth; but—my wife and my children!—must they too meet these dangers? My wife has become what ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware
... "It is the governor's daughter, who guesses everything. He whose riddle she cannot guess is to marry her; but he whose riddle she guesses is put to death." He asked: "Could I, too, go there?" "What, you go, who are a foolish boy! So many students have abstained, and you, so ignorant, wish to go! You will certainly go to your death!" "Well," he said, "my mother told me that she would never see me again, so I will go." He presented himself to the governor and said: "Sir governor, ...
— Italian Popular Tales • Thomas Frederick Crane
... a noble discontent, and curbed with a grand, unconscious patience. She scoured her knives; she shuffled along the streets on hasty errands; she went up and down the house in her small menial duties; she put on and off her coarse, repulsive clothing; she uttered herself in her common, ignorant forms of speech; she showed only as a poor, low, little Irish girl with red hair and staring, wondering eyes, and awkward movements, and a frightened fashion of getting into everybody's way; and yet, behind all this, there was another life that went on in a hidden beauty that ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... be subjugated, my king would suffice to overthrow all these prophecies. And because it is right that I do so, and in order that your Grandeur be not deceived by what is nothing else than the false flattery of ignorant people, I acquaint you with the fact that my king's power is such, and the kingdoms and countries under his royal and Christian rule are so many, that his power and greatness is beyond compare with that of many kings and lords, though they ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume IX, 1593-1597 • E. H. Blair
... wholly and purely to Iceland, in a style unmodified by Latin syntax and derived from the colloquial idiom. The matter is the same in kind as the common matter of heroic poetry. The history represents the lives of adventurers, the rivalries and private wars of men who are not ignorant of right and honour, but who acknowledge little authority over them, and are given to choose their right and wrong for themselves, and abide the consequences. This common matter is presented in a form which may be judged on its own merits, and there is no need to ask concessions from any one in ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... discovered the concealed invention; and the cacique earnestly entreated them not to betray the secret to his subjects and the other Indians, as he kept them in obedience by that policy. This may be said to have some resemblance to idolatry, especially among those who are ignorant of the fraud practised by the caciques, since they believe that it is the cemi that speaks, and all are imposed upon by the deceit, except the cacique and the person who combines with him to abuse their credulity, by which means ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... folding his arms, 'is a very extraordinary person—surrounded by mysteries, ignorant of the taste of beer, unacquainted with her own name (which is less remarkable), and taking a limited view of society through the keyholes of doors—can these things be her destiny, or has some unknown person started an opposition to the decrees of fate? It is ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... were quite ignored by the general profession, and in 1833 it was stated in an authoritative medical treatise that the "cause of gale is absolutely unknown." But even at this time, as it curiously happened, there were certain ignorant laymen who had attained to a bit of medical knowledge that was withheld from the inner circles of the profession. As the peasantry of England before Jenner had known of the curative value of cow-pox over small-pox, so the peasant women of Poland had learned that the annoying ...
— A History of Science, Volume 4(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... of party, the fanaticism of the people, animated those scenes of horror, which do not depose so much against the French nation, at that time governed by strangers, as against the passions of the great, and the ill-directed zeal of the religion of an ignorant populace." ...
— A Trip to Paris in July and August 1792 • Richard Twiss
... that, he thought to see in the faces an air of capability, of assurance, of preparedness, a sort of work-worthiness like the seaworthiness of a vessel which has passed the high test of wind and wave. And to him, untried, unformed, ignorant, the light amateur, all this human mechanism must look for guidance. Humility clouded him at the recollection of the spirit in which he had taken on the responsibility so vividly personified before ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... for her governess, for herself. As to what she is, I can as yet say little," added the old lady, "except that she seems to be affectionate and good-tempered; but she is also idle, wasteful, and ignorant in the extreme. She can't read even English easily enough to amuse herself with any book; and as to sewing, she is ready at a sampler, but could not put the simplest article of clothing together. With regard to any knowledge of the Bible, I much doubt if she can tell if the tower of Babel was ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... (L.). The speeches for the defense have begun, but this ignorant rascal won't let us in. Curse ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al
... modelled by that of Dryden; and it may be remarked that both end with the same fault—the comparison of each is literal on one side and metaphorical on the other. Poets do not always express their own thoughts. Pope, with all this labor in the praise of music, was ignorant of its principles and insensible of ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... discussion as to whether politics degrade women, it will not be out of place to consider the question whether certain women may not, if they have a vote, degrade politics. Of such women there are two classes—the immoral and the merely ignorant. As to the former, much fear has been expressed that they would be the very agents for unscrupulous politicians to use at the polls. Exact data on this matter are not available. I shall content myself with quoting a statement by Mrs. ...
— A Short History of Women's Rights • Eugene A. Hecker
... I thinke, thou art not ignorant How she opposes her against my will? Pro. She did my ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... feared? Some disaster impended over her husband or herself. He had predicted evils, but professed himself ignorant of what nature they were. When were they to come? Was this night, or this hour to witness the accomplishment? She was tortured with impatience, and uncertainty. All her fears were at present linked to his person, and she gazed at the clock, with nearly as much eagerness as my father had done, in ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... made him feel straighter than if she hadn't. Deep, always, was his sense of life with her—deep as it had been from the moment of those signs of life that in the dusky London of two winters ago they had originally exchanged. He had never taken her for unguarded, ignorant, weak; and if he put to her a claim for some intenser faith between them this was because he believed it could reach her and she could meet it. "I can go on perhaps," he said, "with help. But I ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... across country where it was impossible to march on the roads. The civilians told us that utter confusion reigned everywhere. Our foremost troops undoubtedly met determined resistance from the machine gunners, but they were probably blissfully ignorant of what ...
— The Seventh Manchesters - July 1916 to March 1919 • S. J. Wilson
... if a set of scoundrels did not set them on to steal, so that they could buy of the poor ignorant savages, giving them shillings for what ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn
... Bologna, Brussels, or Lima is mentioned, I think at once of sausages, sprouts, and beans, and it gives me a feeling of friendly intimacy. I remember Neufchatel and Cheddar by their cheeses, Dorking and Cochin China by their hens, Whitby by its jet, or York by its hams, so that I am never wholly ignorant of places and their ...
— Penelope's Irish Experiences • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... day. I only know that I flung myself on the dewy grass under a great tree in the first field I came to, and shed tears of such shame, disappointment, and wounded pride, as my eyes had never known before. She had called me a little boy, and my letter a heap of nonsense! She was elderly—she was ignorant—she was married! I had been a fool; but that knowledge came too late, and ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... John looked at James rather helplessly. The case was beyond him. But James was equal to the occasion. He had mastered that first great axiom which every young barrister should lay to heart—"Never appear to be ignorant." ...
— Mr. Meeson's Will • H. Rider Haggard
... told him so—but he should never be one. It was hopeless, and very awful, for people were continually telling him that he would have to earn his own living. No doubt, but how—considering how stupid, idle, ignorant, self-indulgent, and physically puny he was? All grown-up people were clever, except servants—and even these were cleverer than ever he should be. Oh, why, why, why, could not people be born into the world as grown-up persons? Then he thought of Casabianca. He had been examined in that ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler
... morality made with the aid of an intelligence that is derived from the true letter and spirit of the scriptures, are worthy of praise and not those which are made with the help of anything else. Even the words heard from an ignorant person, if in themselves they be fraught with sense, come to be regarded as pious and wise. In days of old, Usanas said unto the Daityas this truth, which should remove all doubts, that scriptures are no ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... are the effusions of his solitary musings, which he retires to holes and corners and the most sequestered parts of the palace to pour forth; or rather, they are the silent meditations with which his bosom is bursting, reduced to words for the sake of the reader, who must else remain ignorant of what is passing there. These profound sorrows, these light-and-noise-abhorring ruminations, which the tongue scarce dares utter to deaf walls and chambers, how can they be represented by a gesticulating actor, who comes and mouths them ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... past, Mrs. Darlington felt more and more uneasy about Mr. Scragg, with whom, she had a decided presentiment, there would be trouble. Had she known where to find him, she would have sent him a note, saying that she had changed her mind about the rooms, and could not let him have them. But she was ignorant of his address; and the only thing left for her was to wait until he came on Monday, and then get over the difficulty in the best way possible. She and Edith had talked over the matter frequently, and had come to the determination ...
— Woman's Trials - or, Tales and Sketches from the Life around Us. • T. S. Arthur
... may be told, is easy for any man; to show what measures the case requires, is the part of a counselor. I am not ignorant, Athenians, that frequently, when any disappointment happens, you are angry, not with the parties in fault, but with the last speakers on the subject; yet never, with a view to self-protection, would I suppress what I ...
— The Olynthiacs and the Phillippics of Demosthenes • Demosthenes
... man nor woman. If God spares my life, my people shall be liberated; I feel different on that subject, now! The difference between the commerce of this world and the glory of heaven brightens before me. I was an ignorant man on all religious matters; I only wanted to be set right in the way of the Lord,—that's all." Again he draws his face under the sheet, writhing with the ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... insulted us as unchristian and heathen, you have proclaimed that four million ignorant negroes but yesterday taken from the savagery of cannibal Africa are our equals and entitled to share in the solemn rights of American citizenship. Your declaration is an open summons that they rise in insurrection with the knife in one hand and ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... ambitious projects, they were opposed by the Emperor Frederick; who was of course anathematised. A curate of Paris, a humorous fellow, got up in his pulpit with the bull of Innocent in his hand. "You know, my brethren (said he), that I am ordered to proclaim an excommunication against Frederick. I am ignorant of the motive. All that I know is, that there exist, between this Prince and the Roman Pontiff great differences, and an irreconcileable hatred. God only knows which of the two is wrong. Therefore with all my power I excommunicate him who injures the other; and I absolve him who ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... nation may be constitutionally applied, it is obvious that the exercise of the power can never be satisfactory. Besides the danger to which it exposes Congress of making hasty appropriations to works of the character of which they may be frequently ignorant, it promotes a mischievous and corrupting influence upon elections by holding out to the people the fallacious hope that the success of a certain candidate will make navigable their neighboring creek or river, bring commerce to their doors, and increase the value of their property. ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Andrew Jackson • Andrew Jackson
... life at sea they know nothing. Strangely enough, only Mr. Clark Russell has attempted to give in literary form a vivid, veracious account of sea-life, and his thrice-noble books are far too little known, so that the strongest maritime nation in the whole world is ignorant of vital facts concerning the men who make her prosperity. Let any one who is well informed enter a theatre when a nautical drama is presented; he will find the most ridiculous spectacle that the mind of man can conceive. ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman |
