"Illusion" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... early-acquired knowledge of the American youth is in the long run salutary; that his image of womanhood is, as is claimed, more "practical," and likely to form a better basis for happiness in life, than the dream and illusion of the English boy; but here we get into a quagmire of mere speculation in which no individual opinion has any ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... handling the raw material dug out of existence and of the artist's self—the process of transmuting life into art? There is no process. That is to say, there is no conscious process. The convention chosen by an artist is his illusion of the truth. Consciously, the artist only omits, selects, arranges. But let him beware of being false to his illusion, for then the process becomes conscious, and bad. This is sentimentality, which is the seed ...
— The Author's Craft • Arnold Bennett
... wonderful to be believed—too much like a happy dream to have the stable feeling of reality—She extricated herself from his close and affectionate embrace, and held him at arm's length, to satisfy her mind that it was no illusion. But the form was indisputable—Douce David Deans himself, in his best light-blue Sunday's coat, with broad metal buttons, and waistcoat and breeches of the same, his strong gramashes or leggins of thick grey cloth—the very copper buckles—the ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... almost too late, to live in each moment as it passed over my head, believing that the sun as it is now rising is as good as it will ever be, and blinding myself as much as possible to what may follow. But when I was young I was the victim of that illusion, implanted for some purpose or other in us by Nature, which causes us, on the brightest morning in June, to think immediately of a brighter morning which is to come in July. I say nothing, now, for or against the doctrine ...
— The Autobiography of Mark Rutherford • Mark Rutherford
... have been an optical—and aural—illusion, for all the trace there was of him. But when the three rode out into the little street, a bullet pinged close to Rowdy's left ear, and the red bark of a revolver spat viciously from a black shadow beside the ...
— Rowdy of the Cross L • B.M. Sinclair, AKA B.M. Bower
... night forward my existence was as it were doubled, and there were in me two men, strangers each to the other's existence. Sometimes I thought myself a priest who dreamt that he was a gallant, sometimes a gallant who dreamt that he was a priest.... I could not distinguish the reality from the illusion, and knew not which were my waking and which my sleeping moments. Two spirals, entangled without touching, form the nearest representation of this life. The young cavalier, the coxcomb, the debauchee, mocked the priest; the priest held the dissipations of the gallant in horror. Notwithstanding ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... actress plays the part of a woman of fashion—of rank. As she makes her first appearance, she is supposed to have returned from the opera. Therefore, though she may wear them but one moment, hood and opera cloak are needed because they will help out the illusion. Suppose, then, she wears a long cloak of velvet or cloth, with a lining of delicate tinted quilted satin or fur; if the impression of warmth or elegance and comfort is given, its work has been well done. But suppose the actress enters in an opera ...
— Stage Confidences • Clara Morris
... world, was the splendid pontiff, Gregory the Great; the great pontiff who sent St. Augustine and his companions to preach the gospel to the English conquerors of Britain. If we would clearly understand the work of St. Augustine we must free our minds from the illusion produced by familiar names. One of these is the name Britain. In the time of Gregory the Great the island called by that name was, of course, the same as that on which Julius Caesar had landed. The barbarians whom Caesar encountered had been subdued by his successors, ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... original of our dome at Washington; but externally I think ours is the more graceful, though the effect inside is tame and flat in comparison. This is owing partly to its lesser size and height, and partly to our hard, transparent atmosphere, which lends no charm or illusion, but mainly to the stupid, unimaginative plan of it. Our dome shuts down like an inverted iron pot; there is no vista, no outlook, no relation, and hence no proportion. You open a door and are in a circular pen, and can look in only one direction,—up. ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... Was it a sweet illusion, this flashing fragment of rainbow; a beautiful vision to fade upon approach, typical of so much that is un-understandable in rook life? He made a dart forward and tapped it with his beak. No, it was real—as ...
— The Second Thoughts of An Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome
... remember, before the dwarf left the queen, he followed us one day into those gardens. I must needs show my wit by a silly illusion between him and the trees, which happens to hold in their language as it does in ours. Whereupon, the malicious rogue, watching his opportunity when I was walking under one of them, shook it directly over my head, by which ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... all have our particular mode of self-expression in moments of elation. Fillmore's took the shape of buying a new waistcoat and a hundred half-dollar cigars and being very fussy about what he had for lunch. It may have been an optical illusion, but he appeared to Sally to put on at least six pounds in weight on the first day of the new regime. As a serf looking after paper-knives and other properties, he had been—for him—almost slim. As a manager he blossomed out into soft billowy curves, ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... the son of Pandu had crossed that car-force, the preceptor Drona, smiling the while, covered him with showers of arrows, desirous of checking his course. Stupefying thy force then with his powers of illusion, and drinking, as it were, those shafts shot from the bow of Drona, Bhimasena rushed against those brothers (viz., thy sons). Then many kings, that were all great bowmen, urged by thy sons, rushing impetuously, began to surround him. Encompassed by them, O Bharata, Bhima smiling ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... at his reflection, the red cross in the center of the shield took on the hue of freshly-shed blood. The period-piece expert who had designed the shield had insisted on the illusion, saying that it made for greater authenticity, and Mallory hadn't argued with him. He was glad now that he hadn't. Raising the visor of his helmet, he winked at himself and said, "I hereby ...
— A Knyght Ther Was • Robert F. Young
... indicated by the reflection of the faces of the king and queen in a small mirror, where you would expect to see your own. The longer you look upon this marvellous painting, the less possible does it seem that it is merely the placing of color on canvas which causes this perfect illusion. It does not seem possible that you are looking at a plane surface. There is a stratum of air before, behind, and beside these figures. You could walk on that floor and see how the artist is getting on with ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... often the realisation of the truth that the idol has feet of clay is enough to burst the iridescent glowing bubble. Too seldom the love deepens, develops into the true and lasting devotion of the woman, clear-sighted enough to see the real man through the mists of illusion, but fondly wise enough to cherish him in spite of his faults, aye, even because of them, as a mother loves her deformed child for ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... before the match, Samuel Wilberforce Gosling came to school with his right arm in a sling. Norris met him at the School gates, rubbed his eyes to see whether it was not after all some horrid optical illusion, and finally, when the stern truth came home to him, almost swooned ...
— A Prefect's Uncle • P. G. Wodehouse
... arrived, and it is easy to understand how an unscrupulous mediaeval Hermann or Kellar might completely deceive even the most intelligent and thoughtful scholars. In scoffing at the credulity of such an age, it should not be forgotten that the "Keely motor" was a late nineteenth-century illusion. ...
— A History of Science, Volume 2(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... alone could act those most wonderful of all plays, watching with hateful, sardonic amusement the light and shadow of emotion upon her dirty face. Oh, he was a magician, no doubt at all of that! Past master in the rare art of a true genius, that of producing illusion. ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... all was, that although the brain and eye were thus impressed with that which had no real existence, I was perfectly calm and self-possessed, knowing the whole thing to be but a pleasing illusion. I did not in the least fear these figures of the brain, but on the contrary found them pleasant company. Not always, however, did they personate the same characters. Occasionally they would change to the old feudal knights, sometimes on horseback, sometimes ...
— Daring and Suffering: - A History of the Great Railroad Adventure • William Pittenger
... when such subjects of antiquity are represented, nothing in the picture ought to remind us of modern times. The mind is thrown back into antiquity, and nothing ought to be introduced that may tend to awaken it from the illusion. ...
— Seven Discourses on Art • Joshua Reynolds
... itself may stimulate a convict. His human mind cannot comprehend despair. Instinct forces him to hope. So weeks, months, years go by, and hope seems to him more instead of less justifiable, till at last, perhaps, he dies with the illusion still strong in him. Real despair is un-human and possibly rare. Otherwise prison mutinies and killings would be more frequent. The argument of despair is, "Since I must die here anyway, I'll take ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... meant the point from which the meteors start on their flight. This point is an apparent one, however, due to an illusion of perspective, for the meteors really approach the earth in ...
— A Field Book of the Stars • William Tyler Olcott
... sufficiently plausible to cause the ruin of the domineering favourite who presumed to treat them rather as inferiors than as equals. Thus the gilded surface of the Court concealed a mass of hatred, jealousy, and unrest, which threatened every instant to reveal itself, and to dispel an illusion as false as it was flattering: and while the foreign guests of the young monarch danced and feasted, and the native nobility struggled to surpass them in magnificence and frivolity, the more thoughtful spectators of the glittering scene ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... "Catholic sovereigns" calculated that nominees of Rome would, of course, prefer the rights of the Church to those of the crown, but they fancied, or they wished to fancy, that priests of their own choice would prefer their interests to those of a stranger. This was an illusion, and therefore Rome made little difficulty; and after due correspondence, and some changes, the Supreme Council of the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... those very celebrated seances with Eusapia. 'When I left Milan,' Richet says, 'I was convinced that all was true; but no sooner was I back in my accustomed channels of work than my doubts returned. I persuaded myself that all had been fraud or illusion.'" ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland
... events at Belgrade on Saturday, July 25, ending with the order for mobilization given by the Serbian Government, which had retired to Kragoujewatz, whither it was followed by the French and Russian Ministers. At Vienna people "soothe themselves with the illusion that ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various
... sheep-farmers follow the same business as Abraham and Isaac, and are as sharp in their dealings as Jacob of old. The Indians are our Bedouins, and like them they "fold their tents and silently steal." Once in looking back the illusion was perfect. The Sea of Galilee was behind us, and upon its banks stood the old cities of Capernaum and Nazareth towered and walled and gray. We had not then seen the verses of Joaquin Miller, in which he expresses the same idea in better words—in ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 90, June, 1875 • Various
... in the new thriving French Morocco, the outline of a ruin or the look in a pair of eyes shifts the scene, rends the thin veil of the European Illusion, and confronts one with the old grey Moslem reality. Passing under the gate of Chella, with its richly carved corbels and lofty crenellated towers, one feels one's self thus completely reabsorbed into ...
— In Morocco • Edith Wharton
... the second place, it links her with the Colonial Puritan stock of which she is so justly proud—being scornful of mere Daughters of the Revolution—and finally, though Mrs. Conklin is a grandmother, her maiden name seems to preserve the sweet, vague illusion of girlhood which Mrs. Conklin always carries about her like the shadow of a dream. And Miss Larrabee punctuated this with a wink which we took to be a quotation mark, and she went on with her work. So we knew we had been listening to the language ...
— In Our Town • William Allen White
... Confucianist, some Christian and syncretic Chondogyo (Religion of the Heavenly Way) note: autonomous religious activities now almost nonexistent; government-sponsored religious groups exist to provide illusion of religious freedom ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... am here, and with one word I could dispel the illusion," he acquiesced. "But I know myself; I am cursed with a peculiar, sinister sense of humor, and I am afraid I would not say the word. Hence, when the husband enters we are all silent. Then I say, 'I regret to have arrived at such an inopportune moment.' I take my hat and walk out, leaving you, ...
— The Devil - A Tragedy of the Heart and Conscience • Joseph O'Brien
... rashly and romantically decided to be Miss Phyllis Desmond. The pianist was indeed Miss Desmond, but to no purpose, if the violinist was some one else; it availed as little that the violinist was the illusion that had lured him to Lower Merritt in pursuit of Miss Desmond's piano, if she were really Miss ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... whole the play is disappointing. The plot is too fantastic; Proteus too much of a cad; Julia, though brave and modest, is yet too faithful; Valentine {149} too easy a friend. The illusion of romance throws a transitory glamour over the scene, but, save in the development of character, the play seems immature, when compared with the ...
— An Introduction to Shakespeare • H. N. MacCracken
... Age,—the fatal Three! Illusion, Struggle, and Regret! So hath it been, so shall it be, And to what end? We know not yet; Still sweeps the mighty life-flood ...
— Poems • John L. Stoddard
... himself had done. First, I sought for the fluid, which he supposes the seminal, in cells containing eggs. Several were actually found with that appearance; and, during the first days of observation, neither my assistant nor myself doubted the reality of the discovery. But we afterwards found it an illusion arising from the reflection of the light, for nothing like a fluid was visible, except when the solar rays reached the bottom of the cells. Fragments of the coccoons of worms, successively hatched, commonly cover the bottom; and, as they are shining, it may easily be conceived that, when much ...
— New observations on the natural history of bees • Francis Huber
... sued in assumpsit, although he had ceased to be liable in debt. /2/ There was the same remedy on a promise in consideration that the plaintiff would marry the defendant's daughter. /3/ The illusion that assumpsit thus extended did not mean contract, could not be kept up. In view of this admission and of the ancient precedents, the law oscillated for a time in the direction of reward as the true essence of consideration. /4/ But the other view prevailed, and thus, ...
— The Common Law • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
... extremely slippery and steep, to which the missionaries had given the name of Baxada del Purgatorio, or Descent of Purgatory. It is a rock of schistose sandstone, decomposed, covered with clay, the talus of which appears frightfully steep, from the effect of a very common optical illusion. When we look down from the top to the bottom of the hill the road seems inclined more than 60 degrees. The mules in going down draw their hind legs near to their fore legs, and lowering their cruppers, let themselves slide at a venture. The rider ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... fight like men." Having thus given due warning, he led his "army" forward, marching and counter-marching his meager forces among the trees and hills to give an appearance of great numbers, while he and his captains helped keep up the illusion by galloping wildly here and there on horses they had confiscated, as if ordering a vast array. At nightfall the men advanced upon the stockade and opened fire ...
— The Old Northwest - A Chronicle of the Ohio Valley and Beyond, Volume 19 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Frederic Austin Ogg
... husband, but the relatives of the sainted Annabel, make her life a burden to her. Then it comes to her knowledge—she obtains absolute proof—that Annabel was anything but the saint she was believed to be. By a single word she can overturn the altar of her martyrdom, and shatter the dearest illusion of her persecutors. Shall she speak that word, or shall she not? Here is a crisis which comes within our definition just as clearly as the other;[8] only it happens to be entirely natural and probable, and eminently illustrative of character. Ought we, then, to despise ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... some of them might have belonged to him whom I have murdered. Therefore I sought for them round about, in the deep beds of the mountain-torrents, and in the high nests of the eagles and vultures. And while I was searching, I sometimes—could it have been only an illusion?—seemed to meet a being who was very like myself, but far, far more powerful, and yet still paler and ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames; for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion."[12] ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley
... layman who asked, "What is impressionism?" Mauclair has given the most succinct answer in his book L'Impressionisme: "In nature," he declares, "no colour exists by itself. The colouring of the object is pure illusion; the only creative source of colour is the sunlight, which envelops all things and reveals them, according to the hours, with infinite modifications... The idea of distance, of perspective, of volume is given us by darker or lighter colours; this is the sense of values; a value ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... real and eternal, - nothing is Spirit, - but God and His idea. Evil has no reality. It is neither 71:3 person, place, nor thing, but is simply a belief, an illusion of material sense. ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy
... shellfish had deepened their love of the sea—its ways of mystery that were ever bringing to their attention some new loveliness of form and tint. Now, before their incredulous eyes there appeared rising from the cloud bank the illusion of graciously rounded domes, spires, minarets, and the next instant they were gazing on a city of enchantment softly reflected in a pearly sea—a silvery city of fantasy like an exquisite shadowy drawing of some foreign land. . . . They sat silent, entranced. How long the vision lingered neither ...
— Where the Sun Swings North • Barrett Willoughby
... changes they were, in May, 1848, established in the home in which they remained during Mrs. Browning's life. It was a suite of rooms on the second floor of the Palazzo Guidi. Of the practical side of this early Florentine life, Mrs. Browning wrote, "My dear brothers have the illusion that nobody should marry on less than two thousand a year. Good heavens! how preposterous it does seem to me! We scarcely spend three hundred, and I have every luxury I ever had, and which it would ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... heeding the interruption. "This violation by the King of the obvious rights of a country engaged in framing a constitution that shall make it free has shattered every philanthropic illusion we still cherished. There are those who go so far as to proclaim the King the vowed enemy of France. But that, of ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... those more forward assisted for doubtful moments, though generally content to maintain a loping trot. Perhaps the rapidity of the changes from one of these paces to the other created an optical illusion, which might thus magnify the powers of the beast; for it is certain that Heyward, who possessed a true eye for the merits of a horse, was unable, with his utmost ingenuity, to decide by what sort of movement his pursuer worked his sinuous way on his footsteps with ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... an illusion, if you will. Wise men have protested that vehemently enough in all conscience. But there are two ends to every stickler for his opinion here. Whether you see, in this fleet hour's abandonment to love, the man's spark of divinity flaring in momentary splendor,—a tragic ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell
... current, losing in a few minutes as much as I had gained in double the time. Fortunately these seizures were brief, but they would leave me sick and shaken and grasping the reeds for support. Another illusion came at this time: I would hear the woman calling, calling my name. Sometimes she cried that I had forsaken her. That left me weaker than the fever of ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... It is the mirage, from the Latin miror, to wonder, which appears to be what you are doing just now. The steamer you see sailing along the shore is an optical illusion, a reflection, and not a reality. Refraction, which is the bending of the rays of light, produces this effect. If you look at a straight stick set up in the water, it will appear to be bent, and this is caused by refraction. The learned gentlemen present will excuse me ...
— Asiatic Breezes - Students on The Wing • Oliver Optic
... with the starred 'tiare's' white, And white birds in the dark ravine, And 'flamboyants' ablaze at night, And jewels, and evening's after-green, And dawns of pearl and gold and red, Mamua, your lovelier head! And there'll no more be one who dreams Under the ferns, of crumbling stuff, Eyes of illusion, mouth that seems, All time-entangled human love. And you'll no longer swing and sway Divinely down the scented shade, Where feet to Ambulation fade, And moons are lost in endless Day. How shall we wind these wreaths of ours, Where there are neither heads nor flowers? Oh, Heaven's Heaven! ...
— The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke • Rupert Brooke
... Greece that gave Life to the world, could not avoid a grave. Hence the inspired Prophets of old Rome Too great for earth fled to Elizium. But the same Ostracisme benighted one, To whom all these were but illusion; It tooke our FLETCHER hence, Fletcher, whose wit Was not an accident to th' soule, but It; Onely diffused. (Thus wee the same Sun call, Moving it'h Sphaere, and shining on a wall.) Wit, so high placed at first, it could not climbe, Wit, that ne're grew, but only show'd by ...
— The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher in Ten Volumes - Volume I. • Beaumont and Fletcher
... noticed, had two separate and distinct images, the tip of the nose of one being about three inches from the tip of the other. I was a little bothered, perhaps startled, and got up and looked in the glass; but the illusion vanished. On lying down again I saw it a second time, plainer, if possible, than before; and then I noticed that one of the faces was a little paler—say five shades—than the other. I got up and the thing melted away; and I went ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. II • John T. Morse
... properties, and not only refused to use it themselves, but endeavoured to prevent it being used by the natives; and a royal decree was actually issued, declaring that the idea entertained by the Indians that cacao gave them strength, is an "illusion of the devil." The mine-owners, however, perceived its importance in enabling the slaves to undergo fatigue; and its use, therefore, rather increased than diminished. It, however, excites the brain, somewhat as does opium, and thus its intemperate ...
— Manco, the Peruvian Chief - An Englishman's Adventures in the Country of the Incas • W.H.G. Kingston
... certain distance in the rear of these, rises a melancholy-looking forest of half-naked trees, with not a single rise or gap along the hazy line of the horizon resting upon them. The glowing heat of this calm day also favoured the illusion, which was certainly in all its points the most perfect imaginable: it would require very little to persuade a man landed here on such a day that ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... them in the universal scheme, how can we condemn them? Must we not plainly either modify our optimism and keep our faith in God within bounds, or, on the other hand, make every failure "apparent" only, sin a phantom, and the distinction between right and wrong a helpful illusion that stings man to effort—but ...
— Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher • Henry Jones
... the mass was sufficient to support his weight. With a double ended paddle rudely shaped from the thin buttress roots of the red mangrove, and comic in the crudeness and disproportion of its parts, he felt himself safe miles out to sea. When he approached a passing vessel he presented the illusion, not of walking, but of sitting on the water, for the float was almost completely submerged. If it became necessary for his wife to attend him on his marine excursions, she was towed behind, and used ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... and interesting illustration of such combinations as Dr. Hibbert has recorded of the spectral illusion with an actual disorder, and that of a dangerous kind, was frequently related in society by the late learned and accomplished Dr. Gregory of Edinburgh, and sometimes, I believe, quoted by him in his lectures. The narrative, to the author's best recollection, ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... the goddess: 'Son! thy grief lay down, And turn this whole illusion on the town:[308] As the sage dame, experienced in her trade, By names of toasts retails each batter'd jade; (Whence hapless Monsieur much complains at Paris Of wrongs from duchesses and Lady Maries;) Be thine, my stationer! this magic gift; Cook shall be Prior,[309] ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope
... dramatic seclusion, but surely in his obstinate avoidance of prose-work of any kind we have a subtler expression of his carefulness for fame. It is a mistake for a poet to write prose, however good, for it is a charming illusion of the public that, comparatively speaking, any one can write prose. It is an earthly accomplishment, it is as walking is to flying—is it not stigmatised 'pedestrian'? Now, your true Bird of Paradise, which is the poet, must, metaphorically speaking, ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne
... are, unless we could describe how fine nature is. All that portion of the history of his country that he has touched upon (wide as the scope is) the manners, the personages, the events, the scenery, lives over again in his volumes. Nothing is wanting—the illusion is complete. There is a hurtling in the air, a trampling of feet upon the ground, as these perfect representations of human character or fanciful belief come thronging back upon our imaginations. We will merely recall a few of the subjects ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... horizon, and then faded, and we were alone again; sometimes the west, at sunset, looked like a city with towers, and we bore down upon its glorified walls, seeking a haven; but a cold gray morning dispelled the illusion, and our hearts sank back into the illimitable sea, breathing a long prayer ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various
... was—should turn out to be interested in Rub-a-Dub, and sorry for his untimely end, why, then, Diana felt there was a possibility of her squeezing a little corner for her in her hearts of hearts. But Mrs. Dolman's next words disturbed the pleasant illusion. ...
— A Little Mother to the Others • L. T. Meade
... next day, there sat Karl, as if nothing had happened, finishing the drawing on which he had been at work when the fit of insensibility came upon him. The painter started, stared, rubbed his eyes, thought it was another spectral illusion, and was on the point of yielding to his terror, when Karl rose, and approached him with a smile. The healthy, sunshiny countenance of Karl, let him be ghost or goblin, could not fail to produce somewhat of a tranquilizing ...
— Adela Cathcart, Vol. 3 • George MacDonald
... the appearance of an old-fashioned log-cabin, and from this we called it "Log-cabin Cliff." The cabin was in reality a butte of shale, as we could see by means of our glasses, and of course of far greater size than a real cabin, but from below the illusion was complete. At this camp, No. 40, we remained the next day, Prof. wishing to make some investigations. He and Jones crossed to the other side and went down on foot two or three miles; then returning ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion which experience must cure, which a ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Lincoln - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 6: Abraham Lincoln • Compiled by James D. Richardson
... construction of the plot was of no consequence to the reader who tasted a novel for the first time in his life. The naivete of the plot was in keeping with the naive, artificially reproduced language of the prophet Isaiah and the biblical annals, which intensified the illusion ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow
... Another illusion which had been dispelled was Lesbia's comfortable idea of her own expectations. Her grandmother had told her that she might take rank among heiresses; and she had held herself accordingly, deeming that her place was among the wealthiest. And now, since Mr. Smithson's ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... when they first caught sight of the Venetian girl, for neither of them had expected such rare beauty; and with the added illusion of the gold-shot veil and the all-generous sunshine, it was nothing less than transcendent. Trombin and Gambardella looked at each other quietly, as they always did when the ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... what you do in particular so long as you have your life. If you haven't had that what HAVE you had? I'm too old—too old at any rate for what I see. What one loses one loses; make no mistake about that. Still, we have the illusion of freedom; therefore don't, like me to-day, be without the memory of that illusion. I was either, at the right time, too stupid or too intelligent to have it, and now I'm a case of reaction against the mistake. Do what you like so long ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... we mean not all writing in verse, nor even all good writing in verse. Our definition excludes many metrical compositions which, on other grounds, deserve the highest praise. By poetry, we mean the art of employing words in such a manner as to produce an illusion on the imagination, the art of doing by means of words what the painter does by means of colors. Thus the greatest of the poets has described it, in lines universally admired for the vigor and felicity of their diction, and still more ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... gross, and let the more subtle parts | of nature escape our observation: | their range is limited to the most | conspicuous information. On the other | hand, they are misleading, by a | fundamental illusion: they offer | things to the mind according to the | measure of human nature. "For it is a | false assertion that the sense of man | is the measure of things. On the | contrary, all perceptions as well of | the sense as of the mind are | according ...
— Valerius Terminus: of the Interpretation of Nature • Sir Francis Bacon
... 1798-'99. If, however, any such hope may have been entertained, but few moons had filled and waned before the defiant occupation of her territory and the enrollment of her citizens as soldiers in the army of invasion must have dispelled the illusion. ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... of over-weening arrogance when it identifies the human self with the universal self and merges man in the Divinity and the Divinity in man, and of demoralizing pessimism when it preaches that life itself is but a painful illusion, and that the sovereign remedy and end of all evils is non-existence. Its mythology is often as revolting as the rigidity of its caste laws, which condemn millions of human beings to such social abasement that their ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... further into his pillow. 'Do as you think best, Sheila,' he said. 'For my own part, I believe it may be as he suggests—partly an illusion, a touch of nervous breakdown. It simply can't be as bad as I think it is. If it were, you would not be here talking like this; and Bethany wouldn't have believed a word I said. Whatever it is, it's no good crying it on the housetops. Give me time, just time. Besides, how do we ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... that she would remain afloat even after they knew the extent of the damage. Some of them may have done so—and perhaps, from their scientific knowledge of her construction, with more reason at the time than those who said she would sink—but at any rate the stokers in our boat had no such illusion. One of them—I think he was the same man that cut us free from the pulley ropes—told us how he was at work in the stoke-hole, and in anticipation of going off duty in quarter of an hour,—thus confirming the time of the collision as 11.45,—had near ...
— The Loss of the SS. Titanic • Lawrence Beesley
... Round thee flinging, Its glad mirth overflowing— Oh! thou Spirit from me springing, Life on me bestowing! Dazzled, blinded, confounded, I see in thy glances The whole world and its rounded Unbounded expanses; And round us it dances In drunken confusion, Like floating illusion; Around thee I'm reeling, All round me is wheeling— And Heaven and Ocean, In flashing commotion, Round us both as thou singest, Roll reeling and rushing— Thou Joy to me that wingest, Thou ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... then reasons for reserving a part of the case from the knowledge even of my father and mother. Being convinced by the result of these enquiries, and by the tenor of Lord Byron's proceedings, that the notion of insanity was an illusion, I no longer hesitated to authorise such measures as were necessary, in order to secure me from being ever again placed in his power. Conformably with this resolution, my father wrote to him on the 2d of February, to propose an amicable separation. Lord Byron at first rejected this ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... masters, to the honest sailors who lived only to do their duty, to little Noemi who died because she was too beautiful, to my grandfather who would not buy the national property, and to good Master Systeme, who was happy inasmuch as he had his hour of illusion. Happiness consists in devotion to a dream or to a duty; self-sacrifice is the surest means of securing repose. One of the early Buddhas who preceded Sakya-Mouni obtained the nirvana in a singular way. He saw one day a falcon chasing a little ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... one would take either gin or whisky, being careful to hold to the nose during the act of swallowing, a sponge well saturated with pure alcohol. Between the pungency communicated to the taste by the horse-radish and the fumes of the spirit invading the nasal avenues, the illusion of a good "square drink" ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, Issue 10 • Various
... rain, we found no difficulty in keeping a straight course. A herd of camels trotted away as we approached and we started up a fox. Otherwise we came across no sign of life. As we advanced mile upon mile the mysterious tower seemed to get further away, an illusion possible in flat countries. I have often observed a similar phenomenon in Holland. Perhaps in this case mirage had ...
— A Dweller in Mesopotamia - Being the Adventures of an Official Artist in the Garden of Eden • Donald Maxwell
... glass of brandy neat to someone who had never been weaned from a milk diet. I have not read Tom Cringle's Log from that day to this, and I think that I should be unwilling now to break the charm of memory, which may be largely illusion. But I remember a great deal of the plot and not a little of the language, and, while I am sure it is enchantingly spirited, I am quite as sure that the persons it describes were far from being unspotted by the world. The scenes at night ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... light and air, through which can be seen a minute bell surmounting a sort of anvil. Such it appears, at least, from the Place Saint Andre des Arts. Symbolically it might be called a piteous appeal, always rejected by souls hardened and hammered by vice, of that anvil which was only an optical illusion, and that very ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... in as great anxiety for the others as for him; so they bore them all away. In every case but one they were misled. But like the man who dreams and takes a fiction for the truth, so the shields cause them to suppose this illusion to be a reality. It is the shields, then, that cause this mistake. [222] Carrying the corpses, they move away and come to their tents, where there was a sorrowing troop. Upon hearing the lament raised by the Greeks, soon all the others gathered, ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... that pass with feet fear-goaded: there They see the likeness of a woman bowed, In depths of anguish sobbing, and her tears Drop, as she mourns grief-stricken, endlessly. Yea, thou wouldst say that verily so it was, Viewing it from afar; but when hard by Thou standest, all the illusion vanishes; And lo, a steep-browed rock, a fragment rent From Sipylus—yet Niobe is there, Dreeing her weird, the debt of wrath divine, A broken heart ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... made the sages smile, Tis something, nothing, words, illusion, wind— Depending more upon the historian's style Than on the name a person leaves behind. Troy owes to Homer what whist owes to Hoyle The present century was growing blind To the great Marlborough's skill in giving knocks, Until his late Life ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... the awakening. He opened his eyes to a murky darkness that was barely relieved by the little night-light. For a second, the nightmare was so strong on his mind that he seemed to see two shadows beyond the door, rushing down the steps. He fought off the illusion, and with straining senses jerked his head around the ...
— Pursuit • Lester del Rey
... and sisters, who have so long been regrettably prevented from making your acquaintance." Bessie Alden lost no time in calling her sister's attention to the injustice she had done the Duchess of Bayswater, whose hostility was now proved to be a vain illusion. ...
— An International Episode • Henry James
... troops, resigned his conquests, respectfully visited the church of St. Peter, and after performing his devotions, offered his sword and dagger, his cuirass and mantle, his silver cross, and his crown of gold, on the tomb of the apostle. But this religious fervor was the illusion, perhaps the artifice, of the moment; the sense of interest is strong and lasting; the love of arms and rapine was congenial to the Lombards; and both the prince and people were irresistibly tempted by the disorders of Italy, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... London ceased its ravages. The street runs down to London Wall. The ground floor of the houses is occupied by shops, in which the different trades of the old City Guilds are carried on. Perhaps the only thing that spoils the illusion—apart from the unavoidably modern crowds of sightseers—is that the interiors of the houses are connected by a gallery that runs from one end of the street to the other, so that you may enter the "Rose" Inn and come out at All Hallows' Church, ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various
... sudden calling for lights to his chamber, and affecting or partly feeling a sudden sickness, he abruptly left the theatre. The king being departed the play was given over. Now Hamlet had seen enough to be satisfied that the words of the ghost were true, and no illusion; and in a fit of gaiety, like that which comes over a man who suddenly has some great doubt or scruple resolved, he swore to Horatio that he would take the ghost's word for a thousand pounds. But before he could make up ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... overlooking the street from the second floor in reality bore no relation to it. For light it depended on a complete oval of lights overhead so arranged as to be themselves invisible, but shining through richly stained glass and conveying the illusion of a slightly clouded noonday. The absence of windows was made up for, as I learned later, by a ventilating device so perfect that, although everyone was smoking, a most fastidious person could scarcely have been offended ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... to acknowledge an evil is in a manner to countenance its existence, and both clung fervently to the belief that a pretty sham has a more intimate relation to morality than has an ugly truth. Yet so unconscious were they of weaving this elaborate tissue of illusion around the world they inhabited that they called the mental process by which they distorted the reality, "taking a true view of life." To "take a true view" was to believe what was pleasant against what was painful in spite of evidence: to grant honesty to all men (with the possible exception ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... upper surfaces of these clouds are not uniformly level, like the under sides seen from the earth, but they are of a conical or pyramidal shape. These imposing masses seem to precipitate themselves upon the earth, as if to engulf it, but this optical illusion was due to the apparent immobility of the balloon, which at the moment was rising at the rate of about twenty ...
— Wonderful Balloon Ascents - or, the Conquest of the Skies • Fulgence Marion
... hesitated. And then—then, a little more than a week ago, I saw the man himself! Changed, without doubt, but not half as much changed as I am myself. Nevertheless, sure as I am of him now, I hesitated then. For it was here in the meadow that you know, near the barn, and the thing seemed so likely to be illusion that I almost suspected my senses. It was dusk, and he was walking and talking with another man, a good deal younger. And presently, while I was still confounded with surprise, and as they passed behind a clump of trees, Mayes was gone, and I saw his companion ...
— The Red Triangle - Being Some Further Chronicles of Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison
... reward some actions, though vicious; and punish other actions, though virtuous."—Bp. Butler cor. "Hence, to such a man, arise naturally a secret satisfaction, a sense of security, and an implicit hope of somewhat further."—Id. "So much for the third and last cause of illusion, that was noticed above; which arises from the abuse of very general and abstract terms; and which is the principal source of the abundant nonsense that has been vented by metaphysicians, mystagogues, and theologians."—Campbell cor. "As to those animals which are less common, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... rose in all the splendor of an unclouded sky in the east, the objects in the west became suddenly elongated vertically, the long rank grass stretching to an amazing altitude, while its various hues of green were reflected with vivid accuracy. As the emigrants approached the optical illusion, it gradually contracted laterally above and below towards the centre, at the same time rapidly receded towards the horizon, until it assumed its original aspect. As the sun approached the meridian, the atmosphere become so intensely warm ...
— The American Family Robinson - or, The Adventures of a Family lost in the Great Desert of the West • D. W. Belisle
... strength, its reason, its knowledge, has been undermining that doctrine with every possible heresy. In sheer wilfulness it has tried to empty life of all its values. It has made us ashamed of loving anything; for all love, it has told us, is illusion produced by the will to live, or the will to power, or some other figment of its own perverse thought. And now, as a result of that perversity, the storm breaks upon us when we seem to have stripped ourselves of all shelter against ...
— Letters of a Soldier - 1914-1915 • Anonymous
... wher thei duelle 1350 Thei ben al redi obeissant As damoiselles entendant To the goddesses, whos servise Thei mote obeie in alle wise; Wherof the Greks to hem beseke With tho that ben goddesses eke, And have in hem a gret credence. And yit withoute experience Salve only of illusion, Which was to hem dampnacion, 1360 For men also that were dede Thei hadden goddes, as I rede, And tho be name Manes hihten, To whom ful gret honour thei dihten, So as the Grekes lawe seith, Which was ayein the rihte feith. Thus have I told ...
— Confessio Amantis - Tales of the Seven Deadly Sins, 1330-1408 A.D. • John Gower
... many a time forfeit some measure of the blind, the head-strong, fanatical zeal that has enabled some men, whose reason was fettered and bound, to achieve results that are nigh superhuman; but therefore none the less is it certain that no man of upright soul should go forth in search of illusion or blindness, of zeal or vigour, in a region inferior to that of his noblest hours. To do our true duty in life, it must ever be done with the aid of all that is highest in our soul, highest in the truth that is ours. And even though ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck
... Of course, we had known it for some time, but had not had the heart to admit it to each other, could not find courage to say that one more golden Summer was at an end. But the paper I had torn from the roadside left us no further shred of illusion. There was an authoritative announcement there was no blinking, a notice to quit there ...
— October Vagabonds • Richard Le Gallienne
... discovery, anticipating no result, the habit once indulged became to her that luxury which writing for the eye of the world is to an author oppressed with the burthen of his own thoughts. At length she saw him, and he did not destroy her illusion. She might have recovered from the spell if she had found him ready at once to worship at her shrine. The mixture of reserve and frankness—frankness of language, reserve of manner—which belonged to Maltravers, piqued her. Her vanity became the auxiliary to her imagination. At ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... impertinent sailor grinning at him from the rigging. Instantly his legs became rigid, and he affected an interest in the horizon intended to convince the sailor that he had been the victim of an optical illusion. Of course it was quite beneath his dignity to take part in these rollicking dances, especially in such a public place as on shipboard. He realized that fully; yet he thought of Bobby and sighed. There were actually times in his life when he almost wished ...
— The Honorable Percival • Alice Hegan Rice
... that this relief from pain was only a sign that Nature had succumbed at last, and that Death had gained the victory. Tom hated to dispel the illusion, but it ...
— Tom, The Bootblack - or, The Road to Success • Horatio Alger
... minds of your audience to accept gladly what follows—and to look forward to it eagerly. You must not only plainly show what the causes of every action are, but you must also make the audience feel what they imply. Thus you will create the illusion which is the chief charm of the theatre—a feeling of superiority to the mimic characters which the gods must experience as they look down upon us. This is the ...
— Writing for Vaudeville • Brett Page
... endless cycle of disease and misery would cease, and a new dawn of hope burst with blinding radiance upon weary humanity. And then a mood of unbelief would darken my mind and I would view the creation of the bacillus as an idle and vain dream, an illusion never to be realized.... ...
— The Blue Germ • Martin Swayne
... throughout his life, to tread the same steps on the same circle; always applauding his past conduct, or, at least, forgetting it to amuse himself with phantoms of happiness, which were dancing before him; and willingly turned his eyes from the light of reason, when it would have discovered the illusion, and shown him, what he never wished to see, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... rather liked making fools of themselves, and that Claudia was no better than the rest. It was one of Eugene's misfortunes that he could not cherish illusions about his friends, unless his feeling toward Stafford must be ranked as an illusion. About the latter he had heard nothing, except for a short note from Sir Roderick, telling him that no tragedy of a violent character need now be feared. He was anxious to see Ayre and learn what passed, but that gentleman had also vanished to ...
— Father Stafford • Anthony Hope
... small hours I dropped off to sleep, and eventually slept soundly, to be awakened by the noise of steam blowing off, close at hand. I started up, listened for a moment to assure myself that the sound was not an illusion, and, satisfied that it was real, scrambled up on the junk's deck, to be greeted with the sight of several ships of war close at hand. A single glance sufficed to assure me that my troubles were at an ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood
... that these things were barbarisms, but held his peace to escape a scolding or reminders of his stuttering. To increase the illusion of approaching maternity she became whimsical, dressed herself in colors with a profusion of flowers and ribbons, and appeared on the Escolta in a wrapper. But oh, the disenchantment! Three months went ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... virtues on which might rest a delightful sympathy, a pure and generous affection, and a tender and trusting confidence between them. On casting her eyes upon him for the first time, however, she felt at the moment like one disenchanted, or awakening from some delightful illusion to a reality so much at variance with the beau ideal of her imagination, as to occasion a feeling of disappointment that amounted almost to pain. There stood before her a young man, with a countenance so like her father's, that the fact startled her. ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... road of antiquity, though no Roman road ever passed over a mountain 10,000 feet in height. The ruin into which it has fallen in many places during the last thirty years of civil war, serves to keep up the illusion, though it falls far short of those ancient roads in the material of which it is constructed, being of small rough stones, covered over with ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... and he crept across that absolutely bare, flat ground, with never a tuft of fur or a feather of a single live thing upon it to be seen, till one might have thought that he had gone mad, and was stalking an illusion—as many, not beasts, have done before him; only they were men, and blew their ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... in their acreage; and the farmhouses which had been without windows in their outer walls, now sometimes opened as many as two to the passing train. Flocks of black sheep and goats, through the optical illusion frequent in the Spanish air, looked large as cattle in the offing. Only in one place had we seen the tumbled boulders of Old Castile, and there had been really no greater objection to La Mancha than that it was flat, stale, and unprofitable and wholly unimaginable as the scene ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells |
