"Scoff" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fruit o' mony a merry dint, My funny toil is now a' tint, Sin' thou came to the warl' asklent, Which fools may scoff at; In my last plack thy part's be ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... conduct presently. When the three came back, like furious creatures, flushed with the rage which the work they had been about put them into, they came up to the Spaniards, and told them what they had done, by way of scoff and bravado; and one of them stepping up to one of the Spaniards, as if they had been a couple of boys at play, takes hold of his hat, as it was upon his head, and giving it a twirl about, jeering in his face, says he to him, "And you, Seignior Jack Spaniard, ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... bear it!" he repeated. "You must bear it, madam. Do you suppose your child is to be exempt from the penalties of his birth? Do you suppose that he alone is to be saved from the upbraiding scoff? Do you suppose that he is ever to rank with other boys, who are not stained and marked with sin from their birth? Every creature in Eccleston may know what he is; do you think they will spare him their scorn? 'Cannot bear it,' indeed! Before you went into your ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... on the point of throwing her pride to the winds and apologizing to Grace, Miriam and Anne for her childish behavior. Then she would scoff at her own weakness and go doggedly on. Her new roommate, Emma Dean, was a cheery sort of girl who lived every day as it came and refused to borrow trouble. She never criticized other girls, nor did she gossip, and she was extremely thoughtful of the comfort of her roommate. ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... Doctor Watson. We are wont to scoff in a patronizing manner at that humble follower of the great investigator; but as a matter of fact we should have been just as dull ourselves. We should not even have risen to the modest height ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... mothers with married sons and daughters; women of society as it is exploited in the Sunday supplements; school girls, shop girls, factory girls—all had told her their troubles; and men of every condition had come to scoff and had remained to express, more or less offensively, their admiration. Some of the younger of these, after a first visit, returned the day following, and each begged the beautiful priestess of the occult to fly with him, to live with him, to marry him. When this happened Vera would touch ...
— Vera - The Medium • Richard Harding Davis
... What city-bred boy could "hold a candle" to the glaring halo about the head of two who could claim personal acquaintance with the great war chiefs Red Cloud and Spotted Tail?—who had actually been to ride and hunt with that then just dawning demigod of American boyhood,—Buffalo Bill? Sneer and scoff and cavil as did their little rivals for a time, calumny was crushed and scoffers blighted that wonderful March morning when, before the whole assembled school, there suddenly appeared that paragon of plainsmen, that idol of all well-bred young Westerners, he whom ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... nothing, and the moment we come across a first-class expert we begin to take a pride in his superiority. It cannot offend us, who have no right at all to be his match on his own ground. Besides, there is a very curious sense of satisfaction in getting a fair chance to sneer at ourselves and scoff at our own pretensions. The first person of our dual consciousness has been smirking and rubbing his hands and felicitating himself on his innumerable superiorities, until we have grown a little tired of him. Then, when the other fellow, the critic, ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... man forlorn Hears Earth send up a foolish noise aloft.' 'And what'll he do? What'll he do?' scoff'd The Blackbird, standing, in an ancient thorn, Then spread his sooty wings and flitted to the croft With cackling laugh; Whom I, being half Enraged, called ...
— Sixteen Poems • William Allingham
... ma'am, be not afraid;—my father! how shall I meet him? how go back to Lyons? the scoff of the whole city! Cruel, cruel, Claude [in great agitation]. Sir, you have acted ...
— The Lady of Lyons - or Love and Pride • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... efforts with roars of laughter, and Jack himself was at first too overcome with merriment to do more than scoff. At last, however, he went for a rope, cast it over the giant's two heads, so, with the help of a team of horses, drew them shorewards, where two blows from the sword of strength ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... imbibed sceptical notions from some source, and might have continued to scoff at religion to the last but for the experience of his intimate friend, a youth named Almond, whose life was changed by witnessing one day the happy death of a Christian believer. Decided to be a Christian himself, it was some time before he mustered courage ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... its praises till we turn against it as we used to do in the Fourth Reader Class, when we all with one accord turned against "Teacher's Pet." Teacher's Pet might be dowered with all the virtues, but we of the commonality would have none of them. We chose to scoff at an excellence ...
— By the Christmas Fire • Samuel McChord Crothers
... repertoire: "How are you, White Hat?" "Put her through!" "Your head's level!" and "Bully for you!" Called him "Daddy,"—begged he'd disclose The name of the tailor who made his clothes, And what was the value he set on those; While Burns, unmindful of jeer and scoff, Stood there picking the rebels off,— With his long brown rifle and bell-crown hat, And the ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... Then he tried to scoff these thoughts away and when they would not leave him, he called himself a simpleton, scolded himself for his fastidious taste, and resolved to start as ...
— The Silver Lining - A Guernsey Story • John Roussel
... objection was likely to be based on substantial grounds. But then, as Brooks had observed, or, rather, inferred, Bill was not exactly an expert on finance, and this new deal savored of pure finance—a term which she had heard Bill scoff at more than once. At any rate, she hoped nothing ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... you may mildly scoff, That hard, afflicting churchyard cough Gives pretty plain advice, "Be off, While yet you can." It is not time yet, John, to doff ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... at, grin at, smile at; poke fun at. satirize, parody, caricature, burlesque, travesty. turn into ridicule; make merry with; make fun of, make game of, make a fool of, make an April fool of[obs3]; rally; scoff &c. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... Yorke in his antagonist's ear with a sinister smile, "rotten manners! for just that, my buck, I'll make you scoff 'muffin' ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall
... money, Spurn its beneficent power; Bears spurn impossible honey, Foxes the grapes that are sour. Men, who can never be funny, Scoff at the funny man's dower; Lands where it seldom is sunny Find ...
— Punch, Vol. 99., July 26, 1890. • Various
... not, friend, with scoff unfeeling, The gentle tale of grief and wrong, Which, all the pain of life revealing, Yet ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various
... follow their conduct here, and witnessed their parents' deep concern, and earned cries to God in their behalf can forget them—they must, they do, at times, affect them. While any thing of this nature remains, there is hope. Some, who in early life, scoff at warning and counsel, are afterwards brought to repentance: And such often testify, that impressions made by parental faithfulness in their tender years, were the means of their awakening and amendment. This should encourage ...
— Sermons on Various Important Subjects • Andrew Lee
... fashionable pillagers; So that this bank house, by their nightly riot, Might rather seem a rake-frequented tavern; And ruin is their sport. Is not each servant A worn-out victim to those midnight revels, Without a sabbath's rest? (For in these times, All sanctity is scoff'd at by the great, And heaven's just wrath defy'd.) An honest master, Scarcely a month beyond his fiftieth year, (Heart-rent with trouble at these sad proceedings,) Wears to the eye a visage of fourscore: Nor to be ...
— The Female Gamester • Gorges Edmond Howard
... possible, that they must provide for themselves. Another Spanish statesman expressed his doubt to them whether they were able to do so: he really thought England would one day become an apple of discord between Spain and France, as Milan then was. It was almost a scoff, to compare the Island that had the power of the sea with an Italian duchy. But from this very moment she was to take a new upward flight. England was again to take her place as a third Power between the two great Powers; the opportunity presented itself to her to begin open war with one of them, ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke
... Tisipherne the damsel turning right, "And what say you, my noble lord ?" quoth she. He taunting said, "I that am slow to fight Will follow far behind, the worth to see Of this your terrible and puissant knight," In scornful words this bitter scoff gave he. "Good reason," quoth the king, "thou come behind, Nor e'er compare thee with the ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... spans the vista of the Avenue, lined here with red brick dwellings and the sunny white bulk of the old Brevoort House. Far off, the sky-scrapers begin to loom, whipping out flags and steam plumes. It is a treeless vista, yet it is hazed with spring! Imagination, you scoff—and dust. Yet you look again, and it is not imagination, and it is not dust. It is the veil of spring, cast with delicate hand over the city. These laughing sight-seers atop the green 'bus now going under the arch feel it, too. These children screaming round your feet, as they ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton
... this very Deity to whom you ascribe unlimited power, and from whom you say you receive life and everything. An eastern despot would take off the heads of those who treated him in such a style; and a republican politician would scoff at the idea of giving office to such lukewarm followers. Why, here in Christian Chicago the will of God is no more heeded by the majority than that of the Emperor of China, and the Bible might as well be the Koran. Looking at these facts from my impartial standpoint, ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... that they could be going to get the worst of it. They seem to put the responsibility for the management of the whole campaign into the hands of the Deity. They are religious but practical. "God will protect us. Here is a pound of coffee," is about what they all come to. It is the fashion to scoff at the calm way in which our enemies have appropriated the services of the Almighty, but all the same it shows a dangerous temper. People who believe they have formed this alliance have always been difficult to ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... bishop murmured, 'Atheist! How sinfully the wicked scoff!' And sent the old men on their way, And drove the boys ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... cadets): Here are the rebels! Ay, Sirs, on all sides I hear that in your ranks you scoff at me; That the Cadets, these loutish, mountain-bred, Poor country squires, and barons of Perigord, Scarce find for me—their Colonel—a disdain Sufficient! call me plotter, wily courtier! It does not please their mightiness to see A point-lace ...
— Cyrano de Bergerac • Edmond Rostand
... no drink? That's your motto, is it? Well, that's sense. Now, look here, ma'am, I ain't beautiful like you; but I'm good, and I'll give you warrant for it. Get me a noggin of rum, and suthin' to scoff, and a penny pipe, and a half-a-foot of baccy; and there's a guinea for the reckoning. There's plenty more in the locker; so bear a hand, and be smart. I don't like waiting; it ain't my way. (Exit MRS. DRAKE, R. PEW sits at the table, R. The settle conceals ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XV • Robert Louis Stevenson
... on and ceased to scoff. Money is a great dignifier, and Jim and 'Lias were making money. There had been some sniffs when the latter had hinged the front gate and whitewashed his mother's cabin, but even that had been accepted now as a ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... you?" she said dramatically. "Look at 'em. They're yours, Miss Rachel—and covered with mud and soaked to the tops. I tell you, you can scoff all you like; something has been wearing your shoes. As sure as you sit there, there's the smell of the graveyard on them. How do we know they weren't tramping through the Casanova churchyard last night, ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... powers of darkness were very near, and that behind those blackened walls there lurked evil forms. Twilight was coming on as we turned back to our car, and a cold mist was slowly rising from the river. I am not superstitious, and in broad daylight I will scoff at ghosts with anyone, but I should not care to spend a night alone in Termonde. One could almost hear the Devil laughing at the ...
— A Surgeon in Belgium • Henry Sessions Souttar
... is a perrito (little dog)!" exclaimed Father Damaso, with a scoff. "One would have to be more of a brute than the natives, who erect their own houses, if he did not know how to build four walls and put a covering over them. That's all that a school ...
— Friars and Filipinos - An Abridged Translation of Dr. Jose Rizal's Tagalog Novel, - 'Noli Me Tangere.' • Jose Rizal
... ter de load en fergit de distress, En dem w'at stan's by ter scoff, For de harder de pullin', de longer de res', En de bigger de feed in ...
— Uncle Remus • Joel Chandler Harris
... I wasn't able to tell you that. You had begun by saying that you believed in palmistry, and then you proceeded to scoff at it. While you scoffed I saw myself as a man with a terribly good reason for NOT scoffing; and in a flash I saw the terribly good reason; I had the whole story—at least I had the broad outlines of it—clear ...
— A. V. Laider • Max Beerbohm
... colouring it by the lights of his wonderful fancy, until at last it became something quite different from the original paradox, and full of truth and wisdom. But when such a paradox went off in a letter, there it remained unqualified; and they who, not having known him, scoff at his friends who claim for him the honours of a great critic, ...
— Old Familiar Faces • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... to the Royal Arms, And crush rebellion, in its infancy. Let's on, and from this siege, calamitous, Assert our liberty; nay, rather die, Transfix'd in battle, by their bayonets, Than thus remain, the scoff and ridicule Of gibing wits, and paltry gazetteers, On this, their madding continent, who cry, Where is the British valour: that renown Which spoke in thunder, to the Gallic shores? That spirit is evaporate, that fire; Which erst distinguish'd ...
— The Battle of Bunkers-Hill • Hugh Henry Brackenridge
... the patience to accompany me through these pages devoted to Miss Dickinson will surely own, whether in scoff or praise, the essentially American nature of her muse. Her defects are easily paralleled in the annals of English literature; but only in the liberal atmosphere of the New World, comparatively unshadowed by ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... of late." He took it, I fear, for he lookt somewhat gruff, And handled his new pair of whiskers so rough, That before all the courtiers I feared they'd come off, And then, Lord, how Geramb[2] would triumphantly scoff! ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... or physicians scoff at the ancient authorities who dominated medical thinking for so many centuries. The seventeenth-century physician striving to reduce the frightful inroads that disease made into the colony at Jamestown may have been handicapped ...
— Medicine in Virginia, 1607-1699 • Thomas P. Hughes
... tell you, with eyes full of scorn, Threadbare is my coat, and my hosen are torn: Scoff on, my rich Owen, for faint is thy glee When the maid of Llanwellyn smiles sweetly ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... the light and glow of life wax dim in thickly gath'ering gloom, Shall mortal scoff at sting of Death, shall scorn ...
— The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi • Richard F. Burton
... mean to worship, mother mine. A great curiosity drew me—I desired to see with my own eyes, and hear with mine own ears, this adoration of the Christ, at which my teachers scoff. But I was caught up in a mighty wave of organ-music that surged from this low earth heavenwards to break against the footstool of God in the crystal firmament. And suddenly I knew what my soul was pining ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... wolves: and their horsemen shall spread themselves, and their horsemen shall come from far; they shall fly as an eagle that hasteth to eat; they shall come all for violence; their faces shall nip as the east wind, and they shall gather the captivity as the sand. And they shall scoff at the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn unto them; they shall deride every stronghold; they shall heap dust and take it." The Chaldaeans, recent occupants of Lower Mesopotamia, and there only a dominant race, like the Normans in England or the Lombards in North Italy, were, on ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 1. (of 7): Chaldaea • George Rawlinson
... scarce be proper now. But they are gone, I know not how, And woman's written on your brow. Time draws his finger o'er the scene; But I cannot forget between The Thing to me you once have been Each sportive sally, wild escape,— The scoff, the banter, and the jape,— And ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... and unimportant in size." Now the private assassin you keep, for us, need not be hampered by mere connoisseurship in the perpetration of his duty—therefore, passe, for the execution—but he should not compromise his master's reputation for brilliancy, and print things that he who runs may scoff at. ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler
... word, I hardly had suspected you so deep. What time I have been wasting! Mr. Faust, At last I know you for a prince of men— A brilliant mind, a high intelligence, A spirit incorruptible. The trash, Baubles and claptrap which the foolish herd Snatch at, you scoff—and rightly. I will not With one more word of it insult your mind That admirably penetrates to deeps Where I, too, love to dwell. I put aside All trivialities, and frankly say That I can offer you ...
— Mr. Faust • Arthur Davison Ficke
... Honorable Margaret promptly. "Saint Ruth's eats 'em alive. I came to scoff and remained to thread needles myself. Phyllis will be minding the babies in ...
— Old Valentines - A Love Story • Munson Aldrich Havens
... ordinary doctrines of the day, and stand supported and encouraged by a few advanced minds; but I was called to place myself where the most earnest souls—unless a second birth could be granted them—would scoff with the ignorance ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... people always grow splenetic— Why, goodness knows—at everything pathetic, And scoff it down. We all know how, of late, An unfledged, upstart undergraduate Presumed, with brazen insolence, to declare That "William Russell"(1)was ...
— Love's Comedy • Henrik Ibsen
... accepted as a matter of course. But who, fifty years ago, could have imagined that to-day women would be steadily monopolizing learning, teaching, literature, the fine arts, music, the church and the theater? And yet that is the condition at which we have arrived. We may scoff at the way women are doing the work, and reject the product, but that does not alter the fact that step by step women are taking over the field of liberal culture as opposed to the ...
— Woman in Modern Society • Earl Barnes
... bosom of the Almighty Father, after alighting, for one painful moment, upon the confines of the lower world. As it was, custom ordained that there should be no mourning for what had never really been. Anguish, hope, and the patient love at which we do not scoff when the mother-bird broods over the eggs that may never hatch—these were to be no more named or remembered. In silence and without sympathy she must endure her disappointment. The tenderest woman about whose knees cluster living ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... The sinner was a scrupulous follower in the presence of the faithful; but when their backs were turned, I know few who relished a porker more lusciously, or avoided water with more scrupulous care. Yet why should I scoff at poor Ali? Joseph and I had done ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... nobility: which is all the more reason why I shouldn't take advantage of it. We may scoff at the social inequalities as much as we please, but we can't laugh them out of court. As between a young woman who is an heiress in her own right, and a briefless lawyer, there are differences which a decent man is bound to efface. ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... a glance. No words will need to pass between us to assure us that we are one in sentiment. It will be as impossible for him to be indifferent to elevating the taste of the masses in matters of domestic detail, or be otherwise wanting in a whole-hearted devotion to the service of humanity, or to scoff at the theory of evolution, as it would be for him to accept the errors and superstitions of an obsolete theology, or the antiquated dogmas of the Conservatives ...
— Fashionable Philosophy - and Other Sketches • Laurence Oliphant
... scoff at chivalrous manners, which are ridiculed in verse, in paintings, and sculptures[372]; or at the elegancies of the bad parson who puts in his bag a comb and "a shewer" (mirror).[373] Other poems are adaptations of the "Roman de Renart."[374] The new spirit ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... to go back!" she announced. "I shall be ready when it's time—now anybody can say what anybody pleases. Scoff at me—do. I expect it! But I'm getting homesick to see a street-car and a—a policeman! It's lovely and peaceful here, but I've had my fill of it now—I want to go home and bump into crowds and hear big, stirry noises. It's different with you ...
— Four Girls and a Compact • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... amazing power of influencing other men. The members of the Scriblerus Club laughed at the Dean's project, but so powerful was his eloquence, that 'those who came to scoff remained to subscribe.' Moreover, with Sir Robert Walpole as Prime Minister, he actually obtained a grant from the State of L20,000 in order to carry out the project, the king gave a charter, and to crown ...
— The Age of Pope - (1700-1744) • John Dennis
... take up my tale, I want to anticipate the doubting Thomases of psychology, who are prone to scoff, and who would otherwise surely say that the coherence of my dreams is due to overstudy and the subconscious projection of my knowledge of evolution into my dreams. In the first place, I have never been a zealous student. I graduated last of my class. I cared more for athletics, and—there is no ...
— Before Adam • Jack London
... enthusiasms, for granted—there was an immense deal in every way that she took for granted. On the other hand, he had often put forward this brighter side of the care for the public weal in his discussions with Gabriel Nash, to the end, it is true, of making that worthy scoff aloud at what he was pleased to term his hypocrisy. Gabriel maintained precisely that there were more ideas, more of those that man lived by, in a single room of the National Gallery than in all the statutes ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... thoughts touched poison and immunity and murder, but inwardly he began to scoff at his own habits of suspicion. However, before he could reach for the glass, Pierce had given a short snort as though in recognition of his presumptuousness and ...
— The Man Who Staked the Stars • Charles Dye
... opposed to those of legal Socialism. Nekrovitch and others often joined in the discussion, and very animated we all grew in the course of debate. Nekrovitch smiled sympathetically at my whole-hearted and ingenuous enthusiasm. He never made any attempt to scoff at it or to discourage me, though he vainly attempted to persuade me that Anarchism was too distant and unpractical an ideal, and that my energies and enthusiasm might be more advantageously expended in other directions. "Anyway," he once said to me, "it is very agreeable to a Russian to see ...
— A Girl Among the Anarchists • Isabel Meredith
... other world into a world of men, women, and the children they rear to follow them. She scorned Mabilla for flinching so much, she scorned her for not flinching more. That Mabilla could be desirable to Andrew King made her scoff; that Andrew King should not know her dangerous kept her ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... the Street, I carried my Hat in my Hand, And to every one that I did meet, I bravely Buss'd my Hand: Some did laugh, and some did scoff, And some did mock at me; And some did say I was a ...
— Wit and Mirth: or Pills to Purge Melancholy, Vol. 5 of 6 • Various
... recognized as exceptional. The city draws the village and rural family to itself, and the contagion of its customs and ideals spreads through the villages and affects the forms of living there. Youths become city dwellers and do not cease to scoff at the village unless later years give them wisdom to appreciate its higher values. The standard of domestic organization is established by the city; that type of living is the ideal toward ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope
... you girls always scoff so at Harold Wilkins," said Fred, slightly aggrieved, "he is generally thought a lot of by girls. All ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... ruthless character; men who absolutely revel in wickedness of the vilest description, who take positive delight in inflicting the most horrible indignities upon those who unfortunately happen to fall into their power, who gloat over the unavailing tears and entreaties of their victims, and who scoff at the mere mention of the word 'mercy'. Picture to yourself the very worst that you have ever heard or read of piratical atrocities, and you will be able to arrive at a very accurate conception of the horrors of which that unfortunate ship was the theatre to-day. And I, my ...
— The Log of a Privateersman • Harry Collingwood
... the universe; and in all our voyages round the world, we are still accompanied by those old circumnavigators, the stars, who are shipmates and fellow-sailors of ours—sailing in heaven's blue, as we on the azure main. Let genteel generations scoff at our hardened hands, and finger-nails tipped with tar—did they ever clasp truer palms than ours? Let them feel of our sturdy hearts beating like sledge-hammers in those hot smithies, our bosoms; with their amber-headed canes, let them feel of our generous pulses, and swear ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... had reached the sticking point only a half hour before, was the result of considerable deliberation. He had argued with himself and had made up his mind to find out for himself just what these people did. He was finding out, certainly. His motives were good and he had come with no desire to scoff, but, for the life of him, he could not help feeling like a criminal. Incidentally, it provoked him to feel ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... know, Andrea," said she, "you do sometimes scoff at religion—well, I mean you talk rather lightly ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope
... to his face. A caitiff hound, A reptile fool, is he who fawns on men Before their faces, while his heart is black With malice, and, when they be gone, his tongue Backbites them. Openly Polydamas Flung back upon the prince his taunt and scoff: "O thou of living men most mischievous! Thy valour—quotha!—brings us misery! Thine heart endures, and will endure, that strife Should have no limit, save in utter ruin Of fatherland and people for thy sake! Ne'er may such wantwit valour craze my soul! Be mine to cherish wise discretion ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... without of death or sick folk. Others, inclining to the contrary opinion, maintained that to carouse and make merry and go about singing and frolicking and satisfy the appetite in everything possible and laugh and scoff at whatsoever befell was a very certain remedy for such an ill. That which they said they put in practice as best they might, going about day and night, now to this tavern, now to that, drinking without stint or measure; and on this wise they did yet more freely ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... Dons' dominion Still subjugates us all, They scoff at our opinion, Our purposes miscall; Will no deliverer appear, And is it vainly, as we fear, We hold our meetings every year ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, March 25, 1893 • Various
... a system of which the impost is the smallest evil. They smite the tax-gatherer, but fall prostrate at the feet of the contemptible prince for whom the tax-gatherer plies his craft; they will even revile the troublesome and importunate monk, or sometimes they will scoff at the sleek and arrogant priest, while such is their infatuation that they would risk their lives in defense of that cruel Church which has inflicted on them hideous calamities, but to which they still cling, as it it were the dearest object ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various
... sure thou dost not invite wild Lemminkainen.' At this the servant asked why she was not to ask Lemminkainen, and Louhi answered: 'Lemminkainen must not come, for he loves war and strife, and would bring disturbance and sorrow to our feast, and scoff ...
— Finnish Legends for English Children • R. Eivind
... dwindled since To penny things—at our Black Prince Historic pens would scoff— The only one we moderns had Was nothing but a Sandwich lad, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, No. - 288, Supplementary Number • Various
... repentance; prayers and curses issuing from his lips in horrible confusion up to the last moment of his existence. His death was witnessed by several of his companions in crime; and, while some tried to laugh and scoff away the unwelcome impression which the scene produced upon their minds, there were others who went into the open air and wandered away by themselves to ponder upon this miserable ending of ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... vent her rage aloud, Let bold blasphemers scoff; The Lord our God shall judge the proud, And cut ...
— The Psalms of David - Imitated in the Language of The New Testament - And Applied to The Christian State and Worship • Isaac Watts
... which your steps have bowed? Think ye, ye hold in your ignoble thrall, Mind, soul, thought, taste, hope, feeling, valor, all? No; these unfettered scorn your nerveless hand, Sport at their will, and scoff at your command, Range through arcades of shadow-brooding palms, Snuff their free airs and breathe their floating balms, Or bolder still, on fancy's fiery wing—[22] Caught from their letters at the noon-day spring— With star-eyed science, and her seraph train Read the bright secrets of yon ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... Ships and their unhallowed mariners. She lives cannilie and quietly; no one knows how she is fed or supported; but her dress is aye whole, her cottage ever smokes, and her table lacks neither of wine, white and red, nor of fowl and fish, and white bread and brown. It was a dear scoff to Jock Matheson, when he called old Moll the uncannie carline of Blawhooly: his boat ran round and round in the centre of the Solway,—everybody said it was enchanted,—and down it went head foremost: and had nae Jock been a swimmer equal to a sheldrake, ...
— Little Classics, Volume 8 (of 18) - Mystery • Various
... legitimate pride, 'God gave us the sea, but we made the shore,' and no one who has seen the artificial barrier that guards the mainland from the Hook to the Texel will disparage their achievement or scoff at their pretensions. ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough
... was in this agony, the report was brought to him that the children of Israel in Goshen were careless and idle in their forced labor. The news aggravated his suffering, and he said: "Now that I am ill, they turn and scoff at me. Harness my chariot, and I will betake myself to Goshen, and see the derision wherewith the children of Israel deride me." And they took and put him upon a horse, for he was not able to mount it himself. When he and his ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... thou not said, 'Be virtuous, be good, be just, for the sake of mankind: but there is no life after this life'? Mankind! why should I love mankind? Hideous and misshapen, mankind jeer at me as I pass the streets. What hast thou done to me? Thou hast taken away from me, who am the scoff of this world, the hopes of another! Is there no other life? Well, then, I want thy gold, that at least I may hasten to make ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... acquaintance with him by laughing at him and trying to cover him with ridicule. But in his presence those who come to scoff remain to pray. Such men really overcome ...
— Essays on Russian Novelists • William Lyon Phelps
... trust you as I trust the stars; Nor cruel loss, nor scoff of pride, Nor beggary, nor dungeon bars, Can ...
— De La Salle Fifth Reader • Brothers of the Christian Schools
... profess to have made a discovery during the last few weeks; that I try to arrange all my actions with a view to the new revelations of life and duty which I have certainly had; in simple language you know that, whereas, I not long ago presumed to scoff at conversion, and at the idea of a life abiding in Christ, I believe now that I have been converted, and that the Lord Jesus is my Friend and Brother; I want to tell you that I have found rest and peace in him. Is it any wonder ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden
... nineteenth century, because it supplies a human and natural craving for excitement. It may not be the dominant type, but it will always exist, and will produce its thrill by ever-varying devices. Those who scoff may be taken unawares, like the company in Nightmare Abbey. The conversation turned on the subject of ghosts, and Mr. Larynx related his delightfully ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... yore so musical, grinning ghastly like the fleshless face of fear-painted death! Is that Voltaire? He who, with wit, thought to shear the Son of God of all His beams?—with wit, to loosen the dreadful fastenings of the Cross?—with wit, to scoff at Him who hung thereon, while the blood and water came from the wound in His blessed side?—with wit, to drive away those Shadows of Angels, that were said to have rolled off the stone from the mouth ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... will be amused." He presented a top-like triangular appearance for one staggering second. The Tinleys did not go 'so' at all, and consequently they lost the satirical man, and were called 'the ballet-dancers' by Adela which thorny scoff her sisters permitted to pass about for a single day, and no more. The Tinleys were their match at epithets, and any low contention of this kind obscured for them the social summit they hoped to attain; the dream whereof ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... of course they will. You surely cannot suppose I should, in cold blood, sit down to write a story in which nobody was to fall in love or be in love! Sir, scoff as you may, love is the one vital principle in all romance. Not only does your cheek flush and your eye sparkle, till "heart, brain, and soul are all on fire," over the burning words of some Brontean Pythoness, but when you ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Knox and of —- Sinclair, his wife, {2a} unlike most Scotsmen, unlike even Mr. Carlyle, had not "an ell of pedigree." The common scoff was that each Scot styled himself "the King's poor cousin." But John Knox declared, "I am a man of base estate and condition." {2b} The genealogy of Mr. Carlyle has been traced to a date behind the Norman Conquest, but ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... addresses himself to SPEAKER, edging in a sentence amid comparative pauses in uproar. PRINCE ARTHUR protests he will not yield to force; Liberals opposite, cheered by news from Walsall, following fast on heels of triumph at Halifax, laugh and scoff. Mr. G. safely packed off to bed; the SQUIRE and his brother officers on Front Bench evidently ready to make a night of it. TIM HEALY, radiant with this rare and rosy reflection of the good old times, observes it is "an excellent hour of the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 18, 1893 • Various
... was apt to scoff, With jokes most aptly timed, Said Sam might any day go off, 'Cause ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... dared not approach the Sacrament, he dared not pray, and sometimes he felt wild impulses to tread down in riotous despair every fragment of a religious belief which seemed to live in his heart only to torture him. He had heard priests scoff over the wafer they consecrated,—he had known them to mingle poison for rivals in the sacramental wine,—and yet God had kept silence and not struck them dead; and like the Psalmist of old he said, "Verily, I have cleansed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... Jupiter we beg For a devouring despot, lank of leg, Of prying eye, and frog-transfixing beak; Though singly we seem weak, United we are strong to smite or scoff. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, March 21, 1891 • Various
... same goal; they want only perfect submission. The gospel now to be preached is not, "Away with me to the land where the fields are fair and the waters flow," but, "Here in your penury, while the rich go idly by and scoff, and the chariot wheels choke you with dust, ...
— Early Letters of George Wm. Curtis • G. W. Curtis, ed. George Willis Cooke
... were better provided with munitions of war; yet the pirates, fighting with the bravery of desperate men, were victorious, and the city fell into their hands. Then followed days of murder, plunder, and debauchery. Morgan saw his followers, maddened by liquor, scoff at the idea of discipline and obedience. Fearing that while his men were helplessly drunk the Spaniards would rally and cut them to pieces, he set fire to the city, that the stores of rum might be destroyed. After sacking the town, the vandals packed their plunder ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... stealing my profits and drinking my champagne that I gave my honour for? and that you'll attend to your duties, and stand watch and watch, and bear your proper share of the ship's work, instead of leaving it all on the shoulders of a landsman, and making yourself the butt and scoff of native seamen? Is that what you mean? If it is, be so good as to ...
— The Ebb-Tide - A Trio And Quartette • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... fair than any in the land, and, indeed, she is the apple of the King's eye.' Her voice was gruff with emotion, but, suddenly becoming very aware that she was talking to a strange young gentleman who might scoff, she seemed to choke and put her hand over ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... "And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray". Prior compares the opening lines of Dryden's ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith
... not only exceeded the French, but all those who have made any attempts on that kind of poetry, the incomparable author of Hudibras excepted. Mr. Cotton likewise translated several of Lucian's Dialogues into burlesque verse, printed in 8vo. London 1675, under the title of the Scoffer Scoff'd. In 1689 a volume of poems, with Mr. Cotton's name prefixed, was published in London: on these poems colonel Lovelace, Sir Alton Cockaine, Robert Harrick, esq; and Mr. Alexander Brome, complimented the author by copies of verses prefixed; ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... make myself friends with Mammon of Unrighteousness, among the magistrates of the Gentiles, and among their mighty men; and it shall come to pass that Darsie Latimer shall be delivered, even if it were at the expense of half my substance." And I said, "Nay, my brother, go not, for they will but scoff at and revile thee; but hire with thy silver one of the scribes, who are eager as hunters in pursuing their prey, and he shall free Darsie Latimer from the men of violence by his cunning, and thy soul shall be guiltless of evil ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... cried Ellen, and swoon'd in his arms, But the PAINT-KING, he scoff'd at her pain. "Prithee, love," said the monster, "what mean these alarms?" She hears not, she sees not the terrible charms, That work ...
— The Sylphs of the Season with Other Poems • Washington Allston
... of the singers—shall, in the journey of their life, at least pass through the zone of song: some of them recognise it as the region of truth, and continue to believe in it still when it seems to have vanished from around them; others scoff as it disappears, and curse themselves for dupes. Through this zone Richard was now passing. Hence the moon wore to him a sorrowful face, and he felt a vague sympathy in her regard, that of one who was herself in trouble, half the light of her lord's countenance ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... their work. Hitherto they had not been able to cast up a mound for their ordnance, so harassed and occupied were they with these incessant alarms. But Rigby, on whom devolved the plan and conduct of the siege, seeing that their affairs were in no thriving condition, but that rather they were the scoff and jest of the garrison, who daily taunted them from the walls, determined at all hazards to raise his cannon. For this purpose a considerable number of the peasantry and poorer sort in the neighbourhood, and for miles round, were driven like beasts to their daily ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... jus' was mad enough To tink he got to hold review Widout his best Dutch ruff. Ma'am said she 'lowed it was de calf Dat had done chawed it off; But when de General heard dat ar, He answered with a scoff; He said de marks warn't don' of teef, But plainly dose ob shears; An' den he showed her to de do' And cuffed me on ye years. And when my ma'am arribed at home She stretched me 'cross her lap, Den took de lace away from me An' sewed it on her cap. And when I dies I hope ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... wan, He looked so great and high, So noble was his manly front, So calm his steadfast eye,— The rabble rout forbore to shout, And each man held his breath, For well they knew the hero's soul Was face to face with death. And then a mournful shudder Through all the people crept, And some that came to scoff at him ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... by a counter-resistance to itself, in a better audience slowly mustering against the first. Forty and seven years it is since William Wordsworth first appeared as an author. Twenty of these years he was the scoff of the world, and his poetry a by-word of scorn. Since then, and more than once, senates have rung with acclamations to ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... beauteous brow Shade after shade is passing now, Like clouds across the pale moon glancing, As thought on rapid thought advancing, Thrills through the maiden's trembling breast, Not doubting, and yet not at rest. Not doubting! Man may turn away And scoff at shrines, where yesterday He knelt, in earnest faith, to pray, And wealth may lose its charm for him, And fame's alluring star grow dim, Devotion, avarice, glory, all The pageantries of earth may pall; But love is of a higher birth ...
— Mazelli, and Other Poems • George W. Sands
... lord. The Romans of old were a very wise people, yet, certes, they placed their faith in such matters. So, too, did the Greeks, and divers other ancient peoples who were famed for their learning. Yet of the moderns there are many who scoff at ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... us are asking, "What is the way out?" As for myself, I confess to being only a student. I have no word of sneer or scoff for any mail's honest thinking, who is sincerely trying to uplift his brothers and sisters; and yet I must say that, as yet, I have not been able to become a disciple of any of the new systems that have been presented. I feel ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks
... too deeply to be conscious of the rudeness in the scoff. "So you figure it out like that—do you? And you get some satisfaction out of that way of looking at it? The scheme of things is very fine, but he must pay the penalty of his own oversight, weakness—carelessness—whatever you choose to ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... constitution of human nature, make it impossible that the theater should exist, save under a law of degeneracy. Its trend is downward; its centuries of history tell just this one story. The actual stage of to-day..is a moral abomination. In Chicago, at least, it is trampling on the Sabbath with defiant scoff. It is defiling our youth. It is making crowds familiar with the play of criminal passions. It is exhibiting women with such approaches to nakedness as can have no other design than to breed lust behind the ...
— Questionable Amusements and Worthy Substitutes • J. M. Judy
... it. They remember him as a babe in arms, as a little, clinging, prattling child. They think of what they have done and suffered for his sake and how the cord of love has been silently woven through the years. My love to you is my greatest bond, and, though some may grow cold, some may scoff, and some repudiate, never let the lips of any say that your rector, your old grey-headed pastor, now in his fourth and last watch, ever ceased in his love ...
— The Fourth Watch • H. A. Cody
... his friendship with Countess Waldersee owes its origin to the motherly way in which she behaved to his wife, acting as her mentor, as her adviser and guide in the intricate maze of Berlin society, and of court life. Debarred from all intimacy with her sisters-in-law, who were ever ready to scoff at, and to make fun of her, Augusta-Victoria was wont to have recourse to the countess in all her difficulties, and inasmuch as Count Waldersee himself is the most brilliant soldier of the German army, and was designated at the time by the great Moltke as his successor and his principal ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... hand; and this message was as a heavy yoke upon me, so that I wept bitterly at the thought of what I should have to pass through. While I wept, I heard a voice say, "weep not, some will laugh at thee, some will scoff at thee, and the dogs will bark at thee, but while thou doest my will, I will be with thee to the ends ...
— Memoir of Old Elizabeth, A Coloured Woman • Anonymous
... in the power of Siva or of his servants.. They call his messengers imposters, and scoff at them when they speak of the ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... a touch of pity. 'Behold the man!' as he meant it, was as if he had said, 'Is this poor, bruised, spiritless sufferer worth hate or fear? Does He look like a King or a dangerous enemy?' Pilate for once drops the scoff of calling Him their King, and seeks to conciliate and move to pity. The profound meanings which later ages have delighted to find in his words, however warrantable, are no part of their design as ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren
... are. I want you here—here where the pain is hardest," and she clasped her arms tightly over her heaving bosom. Then her pride returned again, and with it came thoughts of Arthur Carrollton. He would scoff at her as weak and sentimental; he would never take beyond the sea a bride of "Hagarish" birth; and duty demanded that she too should be firm, and sanction his decision. "But when he's gone," she ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... to take the risks, and remain chief of the guard yourself?" she said with an angry scoff. "Truly there did not seem to be many thrusting forward to strip you of the office. I shall have a fine sorting up of places in payment for this night's work. But for the present, ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... there was a tendency to scoff, or to laugh, at the eugenic movement. It was regarded as an attempt to breed men as men breed animals, and it was thought a sufficiently easy task to sweep away this new movement with the remark that love laughs at bolts and bars. It is now beginning to be better understood. None but fanatics dream ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... Doctor Watson. We are wont to scoff in a patronising manner at that humble follower of the great investigator, but, as a matter of fact, we should have been just as dull ourselves. We should not even have risen to the modest level of a Scotland Yard Bungler. We should simply have ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... in that scent; There's the mother's call to dinner, there's the landlord's call—for rent! And the call of the rooks,—and another call, fur off, Like a whisper from a grave-yard, green and silent. Some may scoff At a Cockney's chat of laylocks. I could bury my old phiz In their crisp and nutty coolness, as I did when flirty Liz, My first sweetheart, sent me packing, one Spring mornin'—for a while— And them blossoms cooled my anger—most ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, May 6, 1893 • Various
... us begin, dear love, where we left off; Tie up the broken threads of that old dream, And go on happy as before, and seem Lovers again, though all the world may scoff. ...
— Poems of Passion • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... Few its end regret. Surely not the Waiter. He his finger had In the pie—or gravy. Did he? Well, 'tis sad. He must cry "Peccavi!" But whoever mixed, Or whoever boiled it, Our opinion's fixed, He, or they, quite spoiled it. 'Tis the general scoff, Butt of chaff and rudeness. Irish ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, March 15, 1890 • Various
... to my making the acquaintance of her husband, the lame old man of whom I had caught a glimpse on the boulevard. She married him for the sake of her son. He is rich, and suffers from attacks of rheumatism. I did not allow myself even a single scoff at his expense. She respects him as a father, and will deceive him as a husband... A strange thing, the human heart in general, and ...
— A Hero of Our Time • M. Y. Lermontov
... all if she could and if she dared. She never seeks the houses of the Busnees but for the purpose of prey; for the wild animals of the sierra do not more abhor the sight of man than she abhors the countenances of the Busnees. She now comes to prey upon you and to scoff at you. Will you believe her words? Fools! do you think that the being before ye has any sympathy for the like ...
— George Borrow - The Man and His Books • Edward Thomas
... Northrup ceased to scoff at his fancy; he wooed it. He pictured the girl's hair loose from the rough cap—curly, rather wild hair with an uplift in every tendril. What colour was it? Gold-brown probably, like the eyes. For five minutes he tried to decide this but knew that he would have to see it again ...
— At the Crossroads • Harriet T. Comstock
... to destruction, as is now plainly evident in the misfortunes of many. True, you have lessened our taxes to the public; but, too, you have increased those to ourselves;—prosecutions, protests, and failures are no blessing to a community. And you dare scoff at the man in his grave whom the whole parish blesses! You dare say he lies in our way,—yes, very likely he lies in your way. This is plainly to be seen; but over this grave you shall fall! The spirit which has reigned over you, and at the same time until now over us, was not born to rule, ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors • Various
... it all; Norbert may give in, he may marry another woman, and I shall be left alone, with my reputation gone, and the scorn and scoff ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... stood with his chin leaning on his clasped hands. 'What is there to laugh at?' he said, without looking at his companion, 'why should you scoff? Yes, you are right: love is a grand word, a grand feeling.... But what sort ...
— On the Eve • Ivan Turgenev
... behalf of this he offers overwhelming evidence." To this Zeno replies, admitting the fact, and adds: "These writings of mine were meant to protect the arguments of Parmenides against those who scoff at him, and show the many ridiculous and contradictory results which they suppose to follow from the affirmation of the One. My answer is an address to the partisans of the many, whose attack I return with ...
— A Short History of Greek Philosophy • John Marshall
... Iskender blurted out the truth at last. "I know not how my patron would regard it. On him I depend entirely for the present. I have heard him scoff at all who change the faith that they were born in. Wait a little, I beseech thee, until ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... meek and unaffected grace, His looks adorn'd the venerable place; Truth from his lips prevail'd with double sway, And fools who came to scoff remain'd to pray. The service past, around the pious man, With steady zeal each honest rustic ran; E'en children follow'd with endearing wile, And pluck'd his gown to share the good man's smile. His ready smile a parent's warmth exprest, Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distrest; ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of a mercurial and nervous temperament, and this fact perhaps may account for the anomaly of a mountain-boy who was a poor shot. Andy was the scoff of Persimmon Ridge. ...
— The Young Mountaineers - Short Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... But again, I check this rising impatience, and console myself under the present prospect with the consideration, that the same beneficent and wise Providence which has done so much for this country, will not eventually leave us to ruin our own happiness, to become the sport of chance, or the scoff of a once admiring world; but that great things are yet in store for this people, which time, and the wisdom of the Great Director will produce in ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall
... obviously just come from one of those elaborate finishing schools in which the daughters of rich people are turned into hothouse plants by sycophants and parasites and sent out into the world the most perfect specimens of superautocracy, to patronize their parents, scoff at discipline, ignore duty and demand the sort of luxury that brought Rome to its fall. With admiration and amusement she watched her say good-by to one woman after another as the various tables broke up. It really gave her quite a moment to see the way in which Joan gave as careless ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton
... Play, and advances upon the outcome of the preceding Act. To whom is Berowne's line (V, ii, 477)—"Speake for yourselves, my wit is at an end"—addressed? How is the King brought to confusion? Is the Princess too hard upon him? Why does Berowne scoff ...
— Shakespeare Study Programs; The Comedies • Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke
... dereliction on the part of the prince's father, of all noble sympathy and generous feeling. Doubtless, he also, whose blood received a mingling tide from his proud mother—he, the acknowledged focus of the kingdom's wealth and nobility, had been taught to repeat my father's name with disdain, and to scoff at my just claims to protection. I strove to think that all this grandeur was but more glaring infamy, and that, by planting his gold-enwoven flag beside my tarnished and tattered banner, he proclaimed not his superiority, ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... two whose love, first foolish, widening scope, Knows suddenly, with music high and soft, The Holy of holies; who because they scoff'd Are now amazed with shame, nor dare to cope With the whole truth aloud, lest heaven should ope; Yet, at their meetings, laugh not as they In speech; nor speak, at length; but sitting oft Together, within hopeless ...
— The House of Life • Dante Gabriel Rossetti
... need we more? Ha! glory!—now speak not of it. By all I hold most sacred and most solemn- By all my wishes now—my fears hereafter- By all I scorn on earth and hope in heaven- There is no deed I would more glory in, Than in thy cause to scoff at this same glory And trample it under foot. What matters it- What matters it, my fairest, and my best, That we go down unhonored and forgotten Into the dust—so we descend together. ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... at last, with strange gentleness, "insult me, scoff at me, overwhelm me with scorn! but come, come. Let us make haste. It is to be to-morrow, I tell you. The gibbet on the Greve, you know it? it stands always ready. It is horrible! to see you ride in that tumbrel! Oh mercy! Until now I have never felt the power of my love for ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... Bart had stirred up a number of enemies, for, when a man is successful in life, are there not always a hundred unsuccessful fellows who stand about and scoff? ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston
... there are some severe pieces, sharply ridiculing his critics. In the old days, when he wrote fine imaginative poetry, out of his heart and brain working together, he did not mind what the critics said, and only flashed a scoff or two at them in his creation of Naddo in Sordello. But now when he wrote a great deal of his poetry out of his brain alone, he became sensitive to criticism. For that sort of poetry does not rest on the sure foundation which is given by the consciousness the imagination has of its absolute ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke
... Gav. My lord, I cannot brook these injuries. Q. Isab. Ay me, poor soul, when these begin to jar! [Aside. K. Edw. Return it to their throats; I'll be thy warrant. Gav. Base, leaden earls, that glory in your birth, Go sit at home, and eat your tenants' beef; And come not here to scoff at Gaveston, Whose mounting thoughts did never creep so low As to bestow a look on such as you. Lan. Yet I disdain not to do this for you. [Draws his sword, and offers to stab Gaveston. K. Edw. ...
— Edward II. - Marlowe's Plays • Christopher Marlowe
... in the Book of Wisdom who say: "Let unrighteousness be our law," 2, 11. Also in Psalms, 12, 4: "Who have said, With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us?" Again in Psalm 73. "They scoff, and in wickedness utter oppression: they speak loftily," etc. Such were the giants who withstood the Holy Spirit to his face, who, through the mouth of Lamech, Noah and the sons of Noah, exhorted, implored, ...
— Commentary on Genesis, Vol. II - Luther on Sin and the Flood • Martin Luther
... which I have come across in the hospital, and which seem to me to bear the mark of the old army as distinct from the new, are: "bondook," a rifle; "sound scoff" (to the bugler, to sound Rations); "scran," victuals, rations; "weighing out," paying out; "chucking a dummy," being absent; "get the wind up," be afraid (and "put the wind up," make afraid); "the home farm," the married quarters; "chips," the pioneer sergeant (carpenter); "tank," wet ...
— Observations of an Orderly - Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital • Ward Muir
... in a glow, And he thinks—with some "cuts"—it will be "a great go," At night, at night! But oh, what a difference In the morning! The critics call the thing "an awful warning," They "guy," and sneer, and scoff, And his bantling's taken off, "To make room for some old farce, Sir!" ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 3, 1892 • Various
... written in pencil on a porcelain card, with the formula in gilt and a coronet. Indeed, the very cans that came up to my bedroom with hot water were marked with coronet and cipher. I was inclined to scoff at this, at first, as ostentatious; but after all, as the things were to be marked, how could ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... virtue in another, especially if it be such a virtue whereunto himself pretendeth. Speech of touch towards others should be sparingly used; for discourse ought to be as a field, without coming home to any man. I knew two noblemen, of the west part of England, whereof the one was given to scoff, but kept ever royal cheer in his house; the other would ask of those that had been at the other's table, "Tell truly, was there never a flout or dry blow given?" To which the guest would answer, "Such and such a thing passed." ...
— Talks on Talking • Grenville Kleiser
... Vicentio been inclined to scoff at this apparition as a heretical innovation, there was still the story of Concepcion, the Demon Vaquero, whose terrible riata was fully as potent as the whaler's harpoon. Concepcion, when in the flesh, had been a celebrated herder of ...
— Legends and Tales • Bret Harte
... was here I have spoken in a great many cities, and to-morrow I am going to do some missionary work at Milwaukee. Many who have come to scoff have remained to pray, and I think that my labors are being greatly blessed, and all attacks on me so far have been overruled for good. I happened to come in contact with a revival of religion, and I believe what they call an "outpouring" at Detroit, under the leadership ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll
... and all connected therewith, had yet much to say in thy praise, when thou wast far inferior to what thou art now, why should true-born Englishmen, or those who call themselves so, turn up their noses at thee, and scoff thee at the present day, as I believe they do? But, let others do as they will, I, at least, who am not only an Englishman, but an East Englishman, will not turn up my nose at thee, but will praise and extol thee, calling thee mart of the world—a place of wonder and astonishment!—and, ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow
... lake, which other people thought so lovely, was, in that mind which affected to scoff at the unseen, a distinct ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 3 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... neighborhood, almost, had assembled in the square, despite the increasing rain. Many had come to scoff. What a farce it all would be! They did well, however, to wait two days! The rain was almost over. It would probably stop by the time they got the ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... is your Indignation, high and noble, And the brave heat of a true Florentine. For Spaine Trumpets abroad her Interest In the Kings heart, and with a black cole drawes On every wall your scoff'd at injuries. As one that has the refuse of her sheets, And the sick Autumne of the weakned King, Where she drunke pleasures ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... was One who could make it strong. Suddenly she felt in her that consciousness which the weakest have at times felt, and which, however the rationalist may scoff, the Christian dare not disbelieve—that sense of not working, but being worked upon—by which truths come into one's heart, and words into one's mouth, involuntarily, as if some spirit, not our own, were at work within us. Such ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... gone abroad that I am in correspondence with France; that I am a traitor to Holland; that I correspond with the Spanish at Antwerp. In vain have I tried to force an open accusation, in order that I might disperse it. The merchants, and others of my rank, scoff at these rumours, and have in full council denounced their authors as slanderers; but the lower class still hold to their belief. Men scowl as I walk along; the boys shout 'Traitor!' after me; and I have ...
— The Cornet of Horse - A Tale of Marlborough's Wars • G. A. Henty
... say it?" demanded her visitor. "And as to speaking sense—. But I'll no' trouble you. It seems you have friends in such plenty that you can afford to scorn and scoff at them at your pleasure. Good-day to you," and ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... quite unobtrusively, without blare of trumpets, skepticism would slip into society. It would be useless for Glanvill and More to call aloud, or for the people to rage. The classes who mingled in the worldly life of the capital would scoff; and the country gentry who took their cue from them ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein
... months in daily communion with the living creature of his imagination, cannot, if he work as artists must, but come into a state of great and secret love for his dream-images. The feeling is sacred, indeed; for what dweller in Philistia but would scoff at such a sentimentality as love for work, and unhappiness at its conclusion? Nevertheless it is true that, when the hour of triumph, the finishing of a long, successful creation is accomplished, and ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... prayer went up, and there were none to scoff, when the aged man bent his knee, and lifted his heart to God in prayer, beseeching him, for Jesus Christ's sake, to have mercy upon their souls. Many prayed in that hour of trial that never prayed before. It was an hour that closed ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna
... plain with you, I am sorry you are an Angler: for I have heard many grave, serious men pitie, and many pleasant men scoff at Anglers. ...
— The Complete Angler 1653 • Isaak Walton
... sentiments concerning Life and its obligations. They were often startling, particularly as she made no secret of the fact that she and her husband never "got on." Between puffs of cigarette smoke she would scoff at the laws of marriage and speak with much leniency of divorce. Her sympathies were invariably with offenders, and Joyce thought her rather too fond of the society of men. Meredith feared and disliked her. The fear was on his wife's account, lest she should be ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... disunion. Who of us is not proud of the greatness we have achieved? Disunion and separation destroy that greatness. Once disunited, we are no longer great. The nations of the earth who have looked upon you as a formidable Power, and rising to untold and immeasurable greatness in the future, will scoff at you. Your flag, that now claims the respect of the world, that protects American property in every port and harbor of the world, that protects the rights of your citizens everywhere, what will become of it? What ...
— American Eloquence, Volume III. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various
... the training quarters, innumerable times; and this continues so long that by the time the "group" is ready for the stage, behold! the cubs with which the patient and tireless trainer began have grown so large that to the audience they now seem like adult and savage animals. Those who scoff at the wild animal mind, and say that all this displays nothing but "machines in fur" need to be reminded that this very same line of effort in training and rehearsal is absolutely necessary in the production of every ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... they should be mistaken in the exercise of their authority, God will reward your obedience. Besides obeying them, you must also help and support your parents if they need your assistance. You must not scoff at or despise them for their want of learning or refinement, because they perhaps have made many sacrifices to give you the advantages of which they in their youth were deprived. Do we not sometimes find persons of pretended culture ignorantly slighting ...
— Baltimore Catechism No. 4 (of 4) - An Explanation Of The Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine • Thomas L. Kinkead |
