"Parsimonious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... two sets of phenomena, the one obvious, the other deeper under the surface, and exactly contrary, the latter is often neglected. This was why the rapidly spent capital of the prodigal was supposed formerly to employ more labour than the invested savings of the parsimonious, and the purchase of native goods to encourage native industry more than the purchase ...
— Analysis of Mr. Mill's System of Logic • William Stebbing
... a regard for the sacredness of statehood to bestow upon this public land such protection and such improvements as might encourage migration to it, and thus hasten the time of full rights for its people, the Republicans might yet have pursued a parsimonious policy, if increasing migration to the United States had not impelled them to action to provide homes for the multitude. No such influx from the Old World had been seen as followed the close of the Napoleonic wars. It was small compared with the full ...
— The United States of America Part I • Ediwn Erle Sparks
... they have the price. That may be a bit beyond them sometimes, but usually there is someone in the crowd who is "flush," and that means who will pay. For the Villagers are not parsimonious; they stand in no danger of ever making themselves rich and thus acquiring place in the ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... of splendor and grandeur which one does not often encounter among the really wealthy. Those cracked shoes were in my mind, I suppose. He seemed to live among great things, but in no niggardly, parsimonious or care-taking way. Here was ease, largess, a kind of lavishness which was not ostentation but which seemed rather to say, "What are the minute expenses of living and pleasuring as contrasted with the profits of ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser
... bare requirements of the case were lavish, the traditional law of the Great Supper ordaining that not fewer than seven different sweets shall be served. Mise Fougueiroun, however, was not the person to stand upon the parsimonious letter of any eating law. Here had been her opportunity, and she had run amuck through all the ...
— The Christmas Kalends of Provence - And Some Other Provencal Festivals • Thomas A. Janvier
... constructed for the use of the household, with incidental accommodation for our immediate friends or guests—which can always be done without sacrifice to the comfort or convenience of the regular inmates. In this remark, a stinted and parsimonious spirit is not suggested. A liberal appropriation of rooms in every department; a spare chamber or two, or an additional room on the ground floor, looking to a possible increase of family, and the indulgence of an easy hospitality, should always govern the ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... thought nobly expressed as on a sally of coarse wit. One would have thought so, to see the indifference with which he treated alike the chatter of the most decided mediocrities and the conversation of the noblest minds of the day. Not an avowal, not a confidence, that shed light on his life work. Parsimonious of all he observed, he never related a typical anecdote, or offered a suggestive remark. Praise, even, did not move him, and if by chance he became animated it was to tell some practical joke, some atelier hoaxes, as if he had given himself up to the ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... in which the individual and his wishes and aspirations have been entirely absorbed by the interests of the community as a whole this Prussia dates back to the father of Frederick the Great. Frederick William I was a hard working, parsimonious Prussian sergeant, with a great love for bar-room stories and strong Dutch tobacco, an intense dislike of all frills and feathers, (especially if they were of French origin,) and possessed of but one ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... to be the richest subject in Europe, very profuse in gardening, birds, and household furniture, but mighty frugal and parsimonious in everything else; of a very lofty mien, and yet not proud; of no deep understanding.—Swift. As great a dunce as ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift
... he was genial and jovial, both lavish and parsimonious,—this latter characteristic being the curious survival of the trait of the ancestors to which he owed his millions. He was growing even heavier, and decidedly red ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... to talk about a dollar, still less about a dollar sign—whatever that may be. It is exactly as if he had made me talk about the Skelt and Stevenson Toy Theatre as 'a cent plain, and two cents coloured' or condemned a parsimonious policy as dime-wise and dollar-foolish. Another interviewer once asked me who was the greatest American writer. I have forgotten exactly what I said, but after mentioning several names, I said that the greatest natural genius and artistic force was probably Walt Whitman. The printed ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... surrounded him. The first step of the red-faced attorney, on finding no state-room unoccupied, was to dispossess two flat-boatmen of theirs, by the payment of a round bonus. Jaspar thought this a rather extravagant move for one apparently so parsimonious; but his mind was too deeply engrossed with the difficulties which environed him to comment ...
— Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue • Warren T. Ashton
... confidence of the British, supported as it was by valour without wisdom or activity, was a "voice" and nothing more. Deeply have we suffered since those words were written, for an arrogant under-estimation of the enemy, a reprehensible delay in preparing for him, and a parsimonious system of carrying out those preparations when attempted. However, it is useless to ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... generosity; the readiest laugh, the readiest tear, and the warmest heart in the world. Transplant her to the Chaussee d'Antin, instil the taste for diamonds, truffles, and Veuve Clicquot, and you poison her whole nature. She becomes false, cruel, greedy, prodigal of your money, parsimonious of her own—a vampire—a ghoul—the hideous thing we call in polite parlance a Fille ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... things exactly in their previous state. He then proceeded to give his opinion as to what reforms should be made in the practice of vivisection. The greatest physiologists, he remarked, such as Harvey, Asselli, Haller, were parsimonious and discreet in their use of vivisection. To-day we have before our eyes a very different spectacle. Under pretence of experimentally demonstrating physiology, the professor no longer ascends the rostrum; he places himself ...
— An Ethical Problem - Or, Sidelights upon Scientific Experimentation on Man and Animals • Albert Leffingwell
... repeated the hostler, and reminded Mackenzie, that he had promised him half a guinea. Archibald had no money in his pocket; but he assured the hostler, that he would remember him the next day. The next day, however, Archibald, who was expert in parsimonious expedients, considered that he had better delay giving the hostler his half-guinea, till it had been earned by his care ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... "plenty to go on with." The result was scarcely what he had anticipated. For a moment she seemed to be struck dumb with a strong surprise. Then, apparently recovering herself, she said decisively, "If that is all we've got, I am perfectly right to be parsimonious. And besides, it's an excellent thing for me to have to think about money. I've always been accustomed to spend far too much. I've lived much too extravagantly, too brilliantly, all my life. A change to simplicity and occasional self-denial will ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... headed by a huge man in the black leather of the Literates' guard, who swung a three-foot length of fire hose with his right hand and fired a pistol with his left, and a boy in a black-and-red jacket who was letting off a burp gun in deliberate, parsimonious, bursts. It was a second or two before Cardon recognized them as Prestonby's bodyguard, Doug Yetsko, and Claire Pelton's brother Ray. There were four Literates' guards and about a dozen boys with them, all firing ...
— Null-ABC • Henry Beam Piper and John Joseph McGuire
... to our duties careful judgment and comprehensive views with regard to expenditure, so that we may be neither parsimonious nor extravagant, but, like a prudent householder, ever careful that expenses shall be less than ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... respects a man of parsimonious habits; and though his bounty might now be the better excused, yet in the more prosperous days of his dominion he had the character of a selfish and greedy priest, whose charity was less than that of his predecessor, and ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... Selden, with parsimonious phrase and copious sense, has thus compressed the result of an historical dissertation: he derives our ancient Christmas sports at once from the true, though remote, source. "Christmas succeeds the Saturnalia; the same time, the same number of holy-days; then the ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... is a poet of a quite different stamp. He is as heedless, gay, and prodigal of his poetical wealth, as the other is careful, reserved, and parsimonious. The genius of both is national. Mr. Moore's Muse is another Ariel, as light, as tricksy, as indefatigable, and as humane a spirit. His fancy is for ever on the wing, flutters in the gale, glitters in the sun. Every thing lives, moves, and sparkles in his poetry, while over all ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... impoverished brain The sudden element that changes things, 130 That sets the undreamed-of rapture at his hand And puts the cheap old joy in the scorned dust? Is he not such an one as moves to mirth— Warily parsimonious, when no need, Wasteful as drunkenness at undue times? All prudent counsel as to what befits The golden mean, is lost on such an one: The man's fantastic will is the man's law. So here—we call the treasure knowledge, say, Increased beyond the fleshly ...
— Men and Women • Robert Browning
... the villagers is plentiful and good, as in the Valais and even in some of the mountain districts of Italy, such as Friuli, the age of puberty for both sexes is quite as much later than in the heart of the towns, where, in order to gratify their vanity, people are often extremely parsimonious in the matter of food, and where most people, in the words of the proverb, have a velvet coat and an empty belly. It is astonishing to find in these mountainous regions big lads as strong as a man with shrill voices and smooth chins, and tall girls, well developed ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... "You have been parsimonious with the tints. It reminds me of some of Lenbach's work which I saw at Florence; it is ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... as chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster. From 1880 to 1882 he was secretary for war, a post he accepted somewhat unwillingly; and in that position he had to bear the responsibility for the reforms which were introduced into the war office under the parsimonious conditions which were then part of the Liberal creed. During his term of office the Egyptian War occurred, in which Childers acted with creditable energy; and also the Boer War, in which he and his colleagues showed to less ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... should have made my wire a bit more explicit," observed the captain turning to Larry. "My wife says I am too parsimonious with my words in telegrams—a British trait possibly." He spoke deliberately and his keen eyes studied his companion's face as he made the casual remark which set Larry's brain reeling. "See here, Holiday, I'm a blunt brute. I don't know how to break things gently ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... holographic adjustment of the c, and erasure of the n, was scarcely a great success, but the Powers supposed it would do. Uncle Mo opposed Aunt M'riar's suggestion that the two letters should go in one cover to Strides Cottage, for economy, as mean-spirited and parsimonious, although he had quite understood that the two Grannies were under one roof; otherwise Dave would have directed to Mrs. Picture at the Towers. So to Strides Cottage they went, some ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... flashing out light in every little ripple; in the late, sunless afternoon the light lay deeply within it, and it seemed jealous of giving back the least particle. He compared it then to an opal or a sapphire, which shine with the same parsimonious radiance. ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... support a wife, and on top of that expense, to run the risk of having children to rear. He had no close kindred excepting a distant cousin or two in Chickaloosa. He kept no servant, and for this there was a double cause. First, his parsimonious instincts; second, the fact that for love or money no negro would minister to him, and in this community negroes were the only household servants to be had. Among the darkies there was current a belief that at dead of night he dug up the bodies of those ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... for the kind thocht, as weel as for the siller; and I shall tell Maggie to keep the knowledge o' it from her aunt, who is a woman o' a vera parsimonious disposition." ...
— A Daughter of Fife • Amelia Edith Barr
... entering the village, the long, straggling street of which soon afforded "the Golden Shoemaker" evidence enough of his deceased uncle's parsimonious ideas. Half-ruined cottages and tumbledown houses were dispersed around; here and there along the main street, were two or three melancholy shops; and in the centre of the ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth
... an unreasonable extent. For one thing, I feel that I cannot work,—much less think,—when opposed by distracting conditions such as women, tea, disputes over luggage, and things of that sort. They subdue all the romantic tendencies I am so parsimonious about wasting. My best work is done when the madding crowd is far from me. Hence I seek out remote, obscure places when I feel the plot boiling, and grind away for dear life with nothing to distract me save an unconquerable habit acquired very early ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... statement must not, of course, be taken too seriously; for, as we have seen, many women, such as Mrs. Washington, Abigail Adams, and Eliza Pinckney, were almost parsimonious in dress during the great strife. Doubtless there were many, however, particularly in the cities, who could not or would not restrain their love of finery, especially when so many handsome and gaily uniformed British officers were at hand. But long before and after the Revolution ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... personal friends of the unlettered son of the ship-carver, as were Horace Vernet, Walter Scott, Andersen, and Mendelssohn; his casket of decorations was the amusement of his lady visitors; and his invitations were so constant that he could not always remember the name of his host: he was at once parsimonious and charitable, cheerful and melancholy. His artistic influence was very strong, exhibiting itself in the style of Tenerani, Galli, Rauch, Drake and Bissen. The life of him by Plon is methodical and complete, and the American version is ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... approach of great and perilous enterprises, amidst which he rivalled his brother in activity and resourcefulness. Accordingly, his Viceroyalty of India moved Bonaparte to envy, patriotic Britons to rapturous applause, and the parsimonious Directors of the Company to carping criticisms. Those who deny to Pitt the gift of choosing able and inspiring men, forget that he made Wellesley Governor-General of India, and supported him in his quarrels with the India House. As Earl of Mornington, Wellesley had helped the Irish Administration ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... with continual profusion, and distributed his beef and ale to such as chose rather to live upon the folly of others, than their own labour, with such thoughtless liberality, that he left a third part of his estate mortgaged. His successor, a man of spirit, scorned to impair his dignity by parsimonious retrenchments, or to admit, by a sale of his lands, any participation of the rights of his manour; he therefore made another mortgage to pay the interest of the former, and pleased himself with the reflection, that his son would have the hereditary estate without the diminution ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... continued, it is hard to say. His last letter was written to his mother in May, 1837, some two weeks before his death; he thanks her for a present of ten dollars,—one may imagine from the gift and the gratitude that he was still held in a strict and parsimonious tutelage,—and begs her prayers and his father's, for after he has seen them again, he shall not have long ...
— Modern Italian Poets • W. D. Howells
... the narration admits of higher ornaments of style, and every fact and sentiment offers itself to the fullest and most deliberate examination. It would appear, therefore, I think, somewhat strange if such writers as these should be found extremely common; since nature hath been a most parsimonious distributor of her richest talents, and hath seldom bestowed many on the same person. But, on the other hand, why there should scarce exist a single writer of this kind worthy our regard; and, whilst there is no other branch of history (for this is history) which hath not ...
— Journal of A Voyage to Lisbon • Henry Fielding
... made to understand that at least nine-tenths of the deaths in England are premature, the representatives of the most parsimonious rate payers will be compelled by the criticism of the public to remember that they also represent the more sacred interests of human life and happiness, and that resistance to sanitary improvements is punished by preventable disease and premature death. High local mortality is largely ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, January 1888 - Volume 1, Number 12 • Various
... and those who are not. Old Euler was not a healthy man. He talked morality, like Jean Michel, but his morals were not the same as Jean Michel's; he had not his sound stomach, his lungs, or his jovial strength. Everything in Euler and his family was built on a more parsimonious and niggardly plan. He had been an official for forty years, was now retired, and suffered from that melancholy that comes from inactivity and weighs so heavily upon old men, who have not made provision in their inner life for their last years. All his habits, ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... long journeys to hear and instruct a chorus. He was intensely avaricious, and from these semi-professionals he reaped a golden harvest. They fed his pockets and they fed his ever-hungry contempt, his scorn of himself and his accomplices. The more money he made, the more parsimonious he became. His wife was so shabby that she never went anywhere with him, which suited him exactly. Because his clients were luxurious and extravagant, he took a revengeful pleasure in having his shoes halfsoled a second time, and in getting the last wear out of a broken collar. He had first ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... gas-jet still struggled bravely with adversity at the end of the raised silver arm of the statuette which had kept to a hair's breadth its graceful pose on the toes of its left foot; and the staircase lost itself in the shadows above. Therese was parsimonious with the lights. To see all this was surprising. It seemed to me that all the things I had known ought to have come down with a crash at the moment of the final catastrophe on the Spanish coast. And there was Therese herself descending the stairs, frightened but plucky. Perhaps she thought ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... another kind of couple who coddle themselves, and who do so at a cheaper rate and on more spare diet, because they are niggardly and parsimonious; for which reason they are kind enough to coddle their visitors too. It is unnecessary to describe them, for our readers may rest assured of the accuracy of these general principles:—that all couples who coddle themselves are selfish and slothful,—that ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... ones she had always known. She wasn't going to hoard her vitality. It must be there when she wanted it, be ready for any strain she chose to put upon it, let her play fast and loose with it; and then, if necessary, she would be ill for a while and pay the piper. But be systematically prudent and parsimonious she would not. ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather
... savory unfamiliar to her and has turned out a dish which her family has declared "tasted like medicine" is, naturally enough, discouraged from wandering after that particular strange god again. The truth is that she has overdone the seasoning. She doesn't want to be parsimonious, which is just what the French cook is with his flavors, only he, more scientifically, calls it using good judgment. If he uses garlic in a salad, it doesn't necessarily follow that the entire household must take on the atmosphere of an Italian barber shop, for he uses garlic or onion, not ...
— Twenty-four Little French Dinners and How to Cook and Serve Them • Cora Moore
... the National Debt" (1786), "Ancient Music" (1787), "Monstrous Craws" (1787), "Frying Sprats" (1791) and "Anti-Saccharites, or John Bull and his Family leaving off the use of Sugar" (1792), are all directed against the reigning House, and allude frequently to the parsimonious habits of George III. and his Queen. The story goes that this monarch, having remarked of Gillray's drawings, "I don't understand these caricatures," the artist drew him ("A Connoisseur Examining a Cooper," 1792) studying minutely with a glass the miniature of Oliver ...
— The Eighteenth Century in English Caricature • Selwyn Brinton
... capable of action, Peepi, by reason of these revolving souls in him, was one of the most unreliable of beings. What the open-handed Zonoree promised freely to-day, the parsimonious Titonti withheld to-morrow; and forever Raymonda was annulling the doings of Voyo; and Voyo the doings ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... king has not had the good fortune to be justified by any party, but is often considered, on what grounds I shall not determine, as one of the greatest mistakes, if not blemishes, of his reign. It is the sale of Dunkirk to the French. The parsimonious maxims of the parliament, and the liberal, or rather careless disposition of Charles, were ill suited to each other; and notwithstanding the supplies voted him, his treasury was still very empty and very much indebted. He had secretly received the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part F. - From Charles II. to James II. • David Hume
... Citizen has long been to devote its columns mainly to the exploitation of what is known in newspaper terminology as "the local story." Of the news of the great outside world we're parsimonious, recognising the fact that the coronation of King Edward VII. is a matter of much less import to our community than the holocaust which was responsible for the destruction of Sir Higginbottom's new hen-house. Similarly a West Indian tornado involving losses running up into hundreds of thousands ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... present, they would not hesitate to scoff at. The disturbing influence of the resolution became at once perceptible, and the earliest means were taken to bring the question to an issue. Mr. Hume, a parsimonious economist, of niggard principle and grovelling sentiment, undertook the office of coercing the Irish. He gave notice of a motion for a call of the House. This man, a mean utilitarian, had been rejected by the country of his birth and ...
— The Felon's Track • Michael Doheny
... forgotten the days of our youth, it is more difficult to convey. He made no attempt whatsoever to understand the man with whom he dined and breakfasted. Parsimony of pain, glut of pleasure, these are the two alternating ends of youth; and Archie was of the parsimonious. The wind blew cold out of a certain quarter - he turned his back upon it; stayed as little as was possible in his father's presence; and when there, averted his eyes as much as was decent from his father's face. The ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... She didn't have to. For the first, last, and only time on The Road, I got all I wanted. I abandoned the bumpers and managed to get out on a side-ladder; it was ticklish work, for I had never encountered car-ends that were so parsimonious of hand-holds and foot-holds ...
— The Road • Jack London
... part of their time with the priest, either at church or in their own houses. Other amusements they have none in this place, except private parties of card-playing, which are far from being expensive. Nothing can be more parsimonious than the oeconomy of these people: they live upon soupe and bouille, fish and sallad: they never think of giving dinners, or entertaining their friends; they even save the expence of coffee and tea, though both are very cheap at Boulogne. They presume that every person drinks ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... the spring (April, I think), but was summarily dissolved. A small quarto volume, of not unfrequent occurrence, I believe, contains some good specimens of the eloquence then prevalent—it was rich in thought, never wordy—in fact, too parsimonious in words and illustrations; and it breathed a high tone of religious principle as well as of pure-minded patriotism; but, for the reason stated above—its narrow circuit and very limited duration—the general character of the Parliamentary eloquence ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... ignorantly committed. As for the son of the hospitable soldier whom I strangled in the cradle, know, that before the boy was born he performed numerous works of charity and mercy; but afterwards grew parsimonious and covetous in order to enrich the child, of which he was inordinately fond. This was the cause of its death; and now its distressed parent is again become a devout Christian. Then for the cup which I purloined from him who ...
— Mediaeval Tales • Various
... sew, embroider unload, exonerate grave, sepulcher readable, legible tell, narrate kiss, osculate nose, proboscis striking, percussion green, verdant stroke, concussion grass, verdure bowman, archer drive, propel greed, avarice book, volume stingy, parsimonious warrior, belligerent bath, ablution owner, proprietor wrong, incorrect bow, obeisance top, summit kneel, genuflection food, nutrition work, occupation seize, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... sir." The expression of Jakoff's face and the way in which he twitched his fingers showed that this order had given him great satisfaction. He was a serf, and a most zealous, devoted one, but, like all good bailiffs, exacting and parsimonious to a degree in the interests of his master. Moreover, he had some queer notions of his own. He was forever endeavouring to increase his master's property at the expense of his mistress's, and to prove that it would be impossible to avoid using ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... Yes—take this coat off; we'll spare no expense. They shall see that I possess wealth; they shall see that though I may be parsimonious ordinarily, still I can spend as well as any of them when an occasion offers. An occasion like this—[with an out-burst.] Eversmann, just imagine! ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... he derived much more than from his father,[1111] is a primitive soul on which Civilization has taken no hold. She is simple, all of a piece, unsuited to the refinements, charms, and graces of a worldly life; indifferent to comforts, without literary culture, as parsimonious as any peasant woman, but as energetic as the leader of a band. She is powerful, physically and spiritually, accustomed to danger, ready in desperate resolutions. She is, in short, a "rural Cornelia," who conceived ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... the first year of her absence from home. She had become accustomed to the habits and manners of those around her; and though some of the girls called her a little Methodist, and sneered at her plain economical dress, even declaring she was parsimonious, because they knew that she rigidly limited her expenses to a very small portion of her earnings, there were others among her associates who fully appreciated the generous self-sacrificing spirit which animated her, and loved her for the gentleness and purity, which ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various
... nothing could be farther from him than creeds and doctrines, and the whole ecclesiastical formalism. There is an atmosphere of sanctity about him that we do not feel about any other poet and essayist of his time. His poems are the fruit of Oriental mysticism and bardic fervor grafted upon the shrewd, parsimonious, New England puritanic stock. The stress and wild, uncertain melody of his poetry is like that of the wind-harp. No writing surpasses his in the extent to which it takes hold of the concrete, the real, the familiar, and none surpasses his in its elusive, mystical suggestiveness, and its cryptic character. ...
— The Last Harvest • John Burroughs
... my ten i sent Sentimentally. Timon is least Testimonials. A mild bear Admirable. Our big hens Neighbours. Peters cable Respectable. Grin o ant Ignorant. I cant tell soon Constellation. Saint lucy heals it Enthusiastically. A minor in soup Parsimonious. On a ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19, No. 528, Saturday, January 7, 1832 • Various
... of the Black-throated Bunting consists of five, or rather two, notes; the first repeated twice and very slowly, the third thrice and rapidly, resembling chip, chip, che-che-che; of which ditty he is by no means parsimonious, but will continue it for hours successively. His manners are much like those of the European yellow-hammer, sitting, while he sings, on ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 13, No. 356, Saturday, February 14, 1829 • Various
... than George the First. George the Second was born at Hanover on October {274} 30, 1683, and was therefore in his forty-fourth year when he succeeded to the throne. He had still less natural capacity than his father. He was parsimonious; he was avaricious; he was easily put out of temper. His instincts, feelings, passions were all purely selfish. He had hot hatreds and but cool friendships. Personal courage was, perhaps, the only quality becoming a sovereign which ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... [107] The parsimonious yet liberal London merchant, whose miserly habits gave Arbuthnot the materials of the story. See Professor Brown's Lectures on the Philosophy of the Human Mind, vol i. p. 244, and Martin Scriblerns, cap. xii., Pope, vol. iv. p. ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... and she had been born. The only one who was self-respecting among the lot was old 'Eliza Countess' as they designated her. It struck Bridget that Eliza Countess and Colin McKeith had points of character in common—it was true they both came from Glasgow. She thought of the parsimonious rectitude—which had of course included linen sheets and fine porcelain and shining silver—of old Lady Gaverick's establishment, of its stuffy conventionality—though that had been soothing sometimes after a dose of Upper Bohemia; and Bridget wept, feeling rather like a wilful ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... young barrister of the present day would be with an annual allowance of L250 or L300. Francis North, when a student, was allowed only L60 per annum; and as soon as he was called and began to earn a little money, his parsimonious father reduced the stipend by L10; but, adds Roger North, "to do right to his good father, he paid him that fifty pounds a year as long as he lived, saying he would not discourage industry by rewarding it, when successful, with less." George Jeffreys, in his student-days, smarted under a ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... gratitude for the exertions of those about him, and his sense of the trouble they underwent, in a very affecting way. With regard to his man-servant in particular, he was very anxious that he should be rewarded by liberal presents; and he pressed me earnestly on no account to be parsimonious. Indeed Kant was nothing less than princely in his use of money; and there was no occasion on which he was known to express the passion of scorn very powerfully, but when he was commenting on mean and penurious ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... name in imperishable characters, and high on the scroll on which are inscribed the story of those, who, in their lives wrought for RIGHT and, passing, died for MEN! For a flag; beneath and within its folds his welcome has been measured and parsimonious;—a country; the construing and application of its laws and remedies as applied to him, has inflicted intolerable INJUSTICE: Has persecuted more often than blessed. And so and thus, its perusal finished, its ...
— History of the American Negro in the Great World War • W. Allison Sweeney
... cadet of the noble family of that name. He passed his youth in contracted circumstances, which gave him early those parsimonious habits which in after-life never forsook him; so that, with one windfall or another, about the time I knew him he was master of four or five hundred thousand pounds; nor did he look, or walk, worth a moidore less. He lived in a gloomy house opposite ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... the Belgians was to provide that sum, which was to be paid into a trust fund. In this and every other matter the King behaved towards Gordon in the most generous and cordial manner, furnishing a marked contrast with the grudging and parsimonious spirit of the British Government towards Gordon in China, at the Cape, and now again when destined for ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume II • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... better time, when the country was not so parsimonious and the Circumlocution Office was not so badgered. He wound and wound folds of white cravat round his neck, as he wound and wound folds of tape and paper round the neck of the country. His wristbands and collar were oppressive; his voice and manner ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... of the German critics think that the passage bears the sense of the gratuity having beer given by the lady, and that so parsimonious a prince as Vespasian was not likely to have paid such a sum as is here stated ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... camp. The place was as picturesque as gipsy camps—when in villages and when business is good—usually are. There were some few persons round the fire, investing their money in prophecy, and a large number of others, poorer or more parsimonious, who stayed just outside the bounds but near enough to ...
— Dracula's Guest • Bram Stoker
... to make choice of a profession. Finding, then, that he was unable to resist his propensity, he resolved to divest himself of the instrument and cause of his prodigality and lavishness, to divest himself of wealth, without which Alexander himself would have seemed parsimonious; and so calling us all three aside one day into a room, he addressed us in words somewhat to ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... afraid, sir, I disgust you with this very dull narration, but believe me punished in the misery that occasions it. You will conclude that during this time I must have been at more expense than I could afford. Indeed the most parsimonious could not have avoided it. The printer deceived me, and my little business has had every delay. The people with whom I live perceive my situation, and find me to be indigent and without friends. About ten days ...
— Crabbe, (George) - English Men of Letters Series • Alfred Ainger
... money—it was in tens of thousands—to an institution of long standing and high character in the city of which he was a quiet resident. The source of such a gift could not long be kept secret. It, was our economical, not to say parsimonious Capitalist who had done this noble act, and the poor man had to skulk through back streets and keep out of sight, as if he were a show character in a travelling caravan, to avoid the acknowledgments ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... from the virtue he found in her; for he would not be burdensome, but would pay the hire for his entertainment, and spend his own money. To which she replied, that he guessed right as to the humanity of her parents; but complained that he should think them so parsimonious as to take money, for that he should have all on free cost. But she said she would first inform her brother Laban, and, if he gave her leave, she would conduct ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... readily be seen that no study of psychology in the ordinary acceptance of the term can give us any clue to these variations in individuals. Yet successful persuasion depends upon as accurate a knowledge as possible of these very differences among people. The parsimonious salesman who takes it for granted that every one's motives are the same as his own, and, therefore, talks to every prospect about the money-saving possibilities of his commodity, will most certainly fail in trying to persuade ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... races. They came with gold all over them; they tinkled with the clash of a million cymbals. The President of the United States almost came. Having no spangles of his own, he delegated a Major-General and a Rear-Admiral to represent Old Glory, and no doubt sulked in the White House because a parsimonious nation refuses to buy braid and ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... back in the hotel and I had gone to my room, I realized that I had made rather good progress. I had ingratiated myself with her, and she had grown very confidential, inasmuch as I was already able to judge that she rather despised her elderly and parsimonious husband, and that she preferred to ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... could. Prue was still aloll on a bed of ease. Even to waken her was to waken a March wind. The moment she was up she would have everybody running errands for her. She would be lavish in complaint and parsimonious of help. And yet she was a dear! She did enjoy her morning sleep so well. It would be a pity to disturb her. The rescuing thought came to Serina that Prue loved to take a long hot bath on Monday mornings, because on wash-day there was always a plenty of hot water in the bathroom. ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... of the two-story frame building that seemed to stagger, or at least to shrink, under the weight of its own importance, the stranger—a man—paused to glance at one of the placards heralding the misfortune and at the same time the far from parsimonious regard of the lady who had been despoiled of a fashionable bulldog. Having perused the singularly comprehensive notice, he deliberately tore it down, folded it with some care, and stuck it into his overcoat pocket. Then he entered the ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... be confounded with the virtuous and parsimonious Caliph of the same name the tenth of the series (reign A.D. 692-705) who before ruling studied theology at Al-Medinah and won the sobriquet of "Mosque-pigeon." After his accession he closed the Koran saying, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... if New England air For his large lungs too parsimonious were, As if those empty rooms of dogma drear 370 Where the ghost shivers of a faith austere Counting the horns o'er of the Beast, Still scaring those whose faith to it is least, As if those snaps o' th' moral atmosphere That sharpen all the needles of the East, Had ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... defence of the Tory party; but he never relinquished his friendship with Addison, for whom he had profound respect and admiration. Swift's life was worldly, but moral. He was remarkably temperate in eating and drinking, and parsimonious in his habits. One of his most bitter complaints in his letters to Stella—to whom he wrote every day—was of the expense of coach-hire in his visits to nobles and statesmen. It would seem that he creditably discharged his ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... womanhood, the young, handsome, and now rich Sabbatai, went his lonely, parsimonious way, and a wondering band followed him, scarcely disturbing his loneliness by their reverential companionship. When he entered the sea, morning and night, summer and winter, all stood far off; by day he would ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... that the parsimonious public should know what has been doing, and still is doing, in this connexion, I mention here that everything set forth in these pages concerning the Court of Chancery is substantially true, and within the truth. The case of Gridley is in no essential altered ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... that if you only knew what it is, you would be miserable." The summer was intensely hot at Bologna, and the plague broke out. In these circumstances it seems miraculous that the four sculptors in one bed escaped contagion. Michelangelo's parsimonious habits were not occasioned by poverty or avarice. He accumulated large sums of money by his labour, spent it freely on his family, and exercised bountiful charity for the welfare of his soul. We ought rather to ascribe them to some constitutional peculiarity, affecting his whole ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... the life the young pair are but just entering on; and the lighter elements, present as carbonic-acid gas is in champagne; and the envious girls, the women absorbed in wondering if their dress is a success, the poor relations whose parsimonious "get-up" contrasts with that of the officials in uniform; and the greedy ones, thinking only of the supper; and the gamblers, ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... the portly lady. "The wife of Captain Tinong is very parsimonious—she has never sent us presents, though we have been to her house. When such a person lets slip a little present of a thousand ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... at length even the senate was no longer able to resist the superior force of circumstances. It was Appius Claudius who in his epoch-making censorship (442) threw aside the antiquated rustic system of parsimonious hoarding, and taught his fellow-citizens to make a worthy use of the public resources. He began that noble system of public works of general utility, which justifies, if anything can justify, the ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... only mean that in relation to human life, for of the flesh and the fowl and the fish you destroy as much as I or any other man. And human life is in no wise different, though you feel it is and think that you reason why it is. Why should I be parsimonious with this life which is cheap and without value? There are more sailors than there are ships on the sea for them, more workers than there are factories or machines for them. Why, you who live on ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... said the star. "A writ of inquisition, you might as well substitute. The act of a polluted, impecunious, parsimonious,—what shall I say? Well, I will be as simple as possible: hotel keeper. In other words, a damnation blighter, sir. Ninety-seven dollars and forty cents. For that pitiful amount ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... dust, and every curtain rent. The corners of the room had been given over for twenty years as the happy hunting-ground of spiders. Although Bideabout had taken some pains to put his house in order before his marriage, repairs had been executed only on what was necessary, and in a parsimonious spirit. The spare room had been passed over, as not likely to be needed. To that as to every other portion of the house, Mehetabel had turned her attention, and it was now in as good condition to receive a guest as the bedrooms ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... protect the frontiers and to sustain the arm of the western generals. The mean and niggardly support accorded the commander-in-chief, was largely instrumental in bringing about the lamentable result. The jealous and parsimonious states of the east, had regarded only their own selfish ends, to the utter exclusion of ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... invest money; put out to interest; provide for a rainy day, save for a rainy day, provide against a rainy day, save against a rainy day; feather one's nest; look after the main chance. cut costs. Adj. economical, frugal, careful, thrifty, saving, chary, spare, sparing; parsimonious &c 819. underpaid. Adv. sparingly &c adj.; ne quid nimis [Lat.]. Phr. adde parvum parvo magnus acervus erit [Lat.]; magnum est vectigal ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... mentioning at further length what she is and was to him. The clergyman of the parish, Mr. Brown, knows the whole circumstances. See him at church, and get him to communicate them to your father. The fact is, this villain, who is at once cunning and parsimonious, had a double motive, each equally base and diabolical, in sending her here. In the first place, he wished, by getting her a good place, to make your father the unconscious means of rewarding her profligacy; and in the second of keeping her as a ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... Henry were not kept with the splendour which characterised those of his rival and successor, Edward IV. Henry's habits were religious, and his house expenses parsimonious—sometimes necessarily so, for he was short of money. From the introduction to the "Paston Letters" (edited by Mr. James Gairdner) it appears that the king was in such impecunious circumstances in 1451 that he ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... to "invest" any considerable portion of their increased wages. Mr. Gould puts this point very plainly and convincingly: "Where economic gains are small, savings mean a relatively low plane of social existence. A parsimonious people are never progressive, neither are they, as a rule, industrially efficient. It is the man with many wants—not luxurious fancies, but real legitimate wants—who works hard to satisfy his ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson
... as a line thir long dimension drew, 480 Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; not all Minims of Nature; some of Serpent kinde Wondrous in length and corpulence involv'd Thir Snakie foulds, and added wings. First crept The Parsimonious Emmet, provident Of future, in small room large heart enclos'd, Pattern of just equalitie perhaps Hereafter, join'd in her popular Tribes Of Commonaltie: swarming next appeer'd The Femal Bee that feeds her Husband Drone 490 Deliciously, and builds her waxen Cells ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... dispute between the old gentleman and his wife—this dispute as to which should be most parsimonious—was typical of their whole course of life. If one saved cheese-parings, the other would go without cheese at all, and be content with dry bread. They lived—indeed, harder than their own labourers, and it sometimes happened that ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... biblio-mercenaries of such sordid inclinations that they would readily part with almost any book in their possession,—even inscribed presentation copies!—if lightly tempted with money considerations. Verily, these parsimonious traders would barter their own souls, if ...
— Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs • Henry H. Harper
... assume that it enjoys the advantages of comfortable rooms, adequate apparatus and competent teachers. And this assumption ought to be supported by the facts. There is no good reason why any town in Massachusetts should be negligent or parsimonious in these particulars. True economy requires liberal appropriations. With these appropriations, the best teachers, even from private schools and academies, can be secured, and all the aids and encouragements to liberal culture can be provided. ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... genius is stamping his own character on the minds of his own people. Take one instance, from others far more splendid, in the contrast presented by FRANKLIN and Sir WILLIAM JONES. The parsimonious habits, the money-getting precepts, the wary cunning, the little scruple about means, the fixed intent upon the end, of Dr. FRANKLIN, imprinted themselves on his Americans. Loftier feelings could not elevate a man of genius who became the founder of a trading people, and who ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... better example of a triumphant beginning to our system could not have been found. But yet there was in it something unfortunate. Had our first hero been compelled to abandon his business by old age—had he become doting over its details—parsimonious, or extravagant, or even short-sighted in his speculations—public feeling, than which nothing is more ignorant, would have risen in favour of the Fixed Period. "How true is the president's reasoning," the people would have said. "Look at Crasweller; he would have ruined Little Christchurch ...
— The Fixed Period • Anthony Trollope
... was one of some embarrassment. At no point in their history had the Dreevers been what one might call a parsimonious family. If a chance presented itself of losing money in a particularly wild and futile manner, the Dreever of the period had invariably sprung at it with the vim of an energetic blood-hound. The South Sea Bubble ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... estate was encumbered when he inherited it, and he had paid off one mortgage by raising another. He might perhaps have used other means, letting his sporting rights and using economy, but this would have jarred. The only Osborn who bothered about money was his wife, and Alice was parsimonious enough for both. Money was certainly what his agent called tight; but as long as he could give his friends some shooting and a good dinner and live as an Osborn ought to live, he was satisfied. Still, Gerald must have his chance at Woolwich and ...
— The Buccaneer Farmer - Published In England Under The Title "Askew's Victory" • Harold Bindloss
... honestly and fully with their subjects. The essays of Dr. Jessopp and Mr. Paul are of course merely Essays, of a score or two of pages: though the first is pretty wide in its scope. There would be nothing but good to be said of either, if both had not been, not perhaps blasphemous but parsimonious of praise, towards "Our Lady of the Rocks." It cannot be too often or too solemnly laid down that an adoration of Madame de Sevigne as a letter-writer is not crotchet or fashion or affectation—is no result of merely taking authority on trust. The more one reads her, and the ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... and because I finally told her I believed I was mistress of my own house Ernest has never forgiven me. Ellen (the sister I loved and went to school with) has married and moved to a distant part of the State. The other members of his family are bigoted, proud, and parsimonious, and they have chiefly made the breach between us. Oh, Beulah, if I could only undo the past, and be Pauline Chilton once more! Oh, if I could be free and happy again! But there is no prospect of that. I am his ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans |
