"Stain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... personage than the Shankaracharya of the Karveer Petha, who took the very noteworthy step of issuing a proclamation solemnly reprobating the murder committed by a Brahman "in the holy city of Nasik" as "a stain on the Brahmanical religion of mercy emphatically preached by Manu and other law-givers." After paying a warm tribute to Mr. Jackson's personal qualities and great learning, and quoting sacred texts ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... may a sinful soul Approach thee with an offering of love, And lay at thy dear feet a weary heart That loves thee, as it loveth God above! If blessed Mary may without a stain Receive the love of sinners most defiled, If the fair saints that walk with her in white Refuse not love from earth's most guilty child, Shouldst thou, sweet lady, then that love deny Which all-unworthy at thy feet is laid? Ah, gentlest angel, be not more severe Than the dear heavens unto a loving ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... is my home of love, if I have ranged, Like him that travels, I return again, Just to the time, not with the time exchanged, So that myself bring water for my stain. ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... his eyes fell on a young fir-tree, standing straight and green, with its top pointing towards the stars, amid the divided ruins of the fallen oak, "here is the living tree, with no stain of blood upon it, that shall be the sign of your new worship. See how it points to the sky. Let us call it the tree of the Christ-child. Take it up and carry it to the chieftain's hall. You shall go no more into the shadows of the forest to keep ...
— The First Christmas Tree - A Story of the Forest • Henry Van Dyke
... by the thro at and yell ed, swear to me thou nev er wilt re veal my se cret, or thy hot heart's blood shall stain this mar bel fib or; she gave one ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton
... upon the page a few chapters back, and gathers upon his name quickly the dark stain of murder. It is true he has received most awful provocation, and the victim of that crime has little of our sympathy. But there is no sign of penitence or of sorrow in the mind of Absalom for this deep offence, by which he has violated God's most holy law. His course runs on; ...
— Is The Young Man Absalom Safe? • David Wright
... still the angel smile would have survived and warned. But the man had not died; the angel itself had deceived; the wings could uphold her no more,—they had touched the mire, and were sullied with the soil; with the stain, was forfeited the strength. All was deceit and hollowness and treachery. Lone again in the universe rose the eternal I. So down into the abyss she looked, depth upon depth, and the darkness had no relief, and the deep had ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... counteth innocence, but thine was a flimsy show, a bit of polished and cherished glass—instead of which, if thou repentest, thou shalt in thy jewel-box find a diamond. Is thy purity, O fair Psyche of the social world, upon whose wings no spattering shower has yet cast an earthy stain, and who knowest not yet whether there be any such thing as repentance or need of the same!—is thy purity to compare with the purity of that heavenly Psyche, twice born, who even now in the twilight-slumbers of heaven, dreams that she washes ...
— Thomas Wingfold, Curate • George MacDonald
... Parlamente, "that we all have need of God's grace, being all steeped in sin; but, for all that, our temptations are not similar to yours, and if we sin through pride, no one is injured by it, nor do our bodies and hands receive a stain. But your pleasure consists in dishonouring women, and your honour in slaying men in war—two things expressly contrary to ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... pity you he will be so far from pitying you in your doleful case that he will only tread you under foot. . . . He will crush out your blood and make it fly, and it shall be sprinkled on his garments so as to stain all his raiment." But Edwards was a rapt soul, possessed with the love as well as the fear of the God, and there are passages of sweet and exalted feeling in his Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, 1746. Such is his portrait of Sarah Pierpont, "a young ...
— Initial Studies in American Letters • Henry A. Beers
... transportation, the labor it afforded had been long employed. Habit had reconciled the minds of many to its inferiority; and the means of supplying its place were confessedly contingent and remote. A new society, having no disabilities to remove, no moral stain to obliterate, and formed of elements in natural proportion, could not hesitate a moment. Economical experience would dictate the rejection of slaves. But to clear away the refuse of a long-existing social state, and to build anew, was a formidable undertaking, however certain ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... than speech, and thought, wreathing itself with flowers, allows itself to be seen without disguise, and brought the countess to the highest pitch of enthusiasm. She believed she saw in Raoul one of the noblest spirits of the epoch, a delicate but misjudged heart without a stain and worthy of adoration; she saw him advancing with a brave hand to grasp the sceptre of power. Soon that speech so beautiful in love would echo from the tribune. Marie now lived only in this life of a world outside her own. Her taste was lost for the ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac
... was rising over the citied hills of San Francisco; the bay was perfect, not a ripple, scarce a stain upon its blue expanse, everything was waiting breathless ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Margaret Moyes Black
... samples of his wares, greatly overrating their value. 'Behold!' he would exclaim, 'is not this elegantly-moulded idol worthy of the place of honour in this sumptuous mansion which my presence defiles to such an extent that twelve basins of rose-water will not remove the stain? Are not its eyes more delicate than the most select of almonds? and is not its stomach rounder than the cupolas upon the high temple at Peking? Yet, in spite of its perfections, it is not worthy of the acceptance of so distinguished a Mandarin, and therefore I will accept in return ...
— The Wallet of Kai Lung • Ernest Bramah
... whither flee you, nimble rambler. You that cheat an honest gambler? You that shake with fear and shiver. All a-tremble, all a-quiver; You that cannot trip enough. On the level ground and rough; You that stain your social ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka
... tie that unites us! Look at her, sire; look at her sweet, innocent, tear-stricken face! What has she done that you should thrust her from your heart, and doom her to confront, alone, the sneers and hatred of your cruel relatives? She is pure, and her heart is without a stain. I tell you so—I, who in unspeakable anxiety have watched her through hired spies. Had I found her guilty I would have been the first to condemn her; but Antoinette is good, pure, virtuous, and she has but one defect—want ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... the route profane, The holy hermit poured his prayer: "Forbear with blood God's house to stain: ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... Forgery by death. The opinions which he expressed, Mr. Brougham said, he had learned from his great and lamented friend, Sir Samuel Romilly; and he concluded by expressing his hope that he should live to see the day when this stain should be removed from our statute-book. In the following month Mr. Brougham brought in a bill for local jurisdictions in England, for diminishing the expense of legal proceedings. On June 24, Mr. Brougham spoke at great length upon the inadequacy of the ministerial bill for the reform ...
— The Mirror Of Literature, Amusement, And Instruction, No. 496 - Vol. 17, No. 496, June 27, 1831 • Various
... as I left Richard, this he said to me: 'My honour, Katherine, is now in your keeping.' By the lifting of one eyelash, I will not stain it." ...
— The Bow of Orange Ribbon - A Romance of New York • Amelia E. Barr
... caught in the arms of his friends. They conveyed him to the castle, where the duchess received him with cries of anguish. He embraced her tenderly, minutely described the circumstances of his assassination, and expressed himself grieved in view of the stain which such a crime would inflict upon the honor of France. He exhorted his wife to bow in submission to the will of Heaven, and kissing his son Henry, the Duke of Joinville, who was weeping by his ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... Even as I bade they do, range their swords in cover among the grass, and hide their shields out of sight. So when they swooped clamorously down along the winding shore, Misenus from his watch-tower on high signals on the hollow brass; my comrades rush in and essay the strange battle, to set the stain of steel on the winged horrors of the sea. But they take no violence on their plumage, nor wounds on their bodies; and soaring into the firmament with rapid flight, leave their foul traces on the spoil they had half consumed. Celaeno ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... men, chosen from the whole army, to wash themselves in pure water, and clothe themselves in white, so that there would be about them no stain or sign of blood. This done, they entered the Temple of Juno, bowing low, and taking care not to touch the statue of the goddess, which only the priest could touch. They asked the goddess whether it was her pleasure to go with ...
— Historic Tales, Volume 11 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... and, under that vaporous veil, how profound and inscrutable! How easy to slip into its all-embracing arms, and sink into its yielding bosom, leaving behind no stain, trace, or record! A surer oblivion than the Church, which could not absolve memory, grant forgetfulness, nor even hide the ghastly footprints of its occupants. Here was obliteration. But was he sure of that? He thought of the body of the murdered Peruvian, laid out at ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... harmless heart again, Which no unworthy thought could stain: But if it has been taught by thine To forfeit both Its word and oath, Keep it, for then ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... off and running into the shop again he clanked down upon his knees before the image of the Virgin upon the smithy wall. There from his heart he prayed that no shadow or stain should come upon his soul or his honor whilst these arms incased his body, and that he might be strengthened to use them for noble and godly ends. A strange turn this to a religion of peace, and yet for many a century the sword and the faith had upheld each other and ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... broken off. She did not become angry, or declare that she took him at his word; but with a low voice she said that she was aware that her determination gave him an option in the matter. He would certainly be justified in so resolving; nay, might do so without the slightest stain upon his faith. She herself would not violate the truth by saying that such a decision would give her pleasure; that it would—would— Here for the first time she became rather agitated, and before she could finish, George was at her feet, swearing that he could not, would not live without ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... no! trial only shows The bitter juice of forsaken woes; Where former bliss, present evils do stain; Nay, former bliss adds to present pain, While remembrance doth both states contain. Come, learners, then to me, the model of mishap, Ingulphed in despair, slid down from Fortune's lap; And, as you like my double lot, Tread in my steps, or ...
— A Defence of Poesie and Poems • Philip Sidney
... I bring you rather The thorny brambles from the market-place, With crimson-spots, the stain of civic blood, That flowed at your ...
— Early Plays - Catiline, The Warrior's Barrow, Olaf Liljekrans • Henrik Ibsen
... the young soldier, even if he had not been vindicated so handsomely, would have lived down most of the suspicion in time, yet all of the stain would never have vanished had it ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock
... waited in deepest silence. The venerable Pontiff resumed in a strong voice, which shortly rose to a tone of enthusiasm: "We declare, pronounce and define, that the doctrine which affirms that the Blessed Virgin Mary was preserved and exempt from all stain of original sin from the first moment of her conception, in consideration of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of mankind, is a doctrine revealed by God, and which, for this cause, the faithful must firmly and constantly believe. Wherefore, if any one should be so presumptuous, which, God ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell
... it? (Smiling, to HELGI.) You may depend upon me for rewarding you for the precious stain you have put on my veil. Not just now. I shall find ...
— Poet Lore, Volume XXIV, Number IV, 1912 • Various
... a stain upon our tents if this youth be lost,' said Eva in a low voice, yet attempting to speak ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... that the man had not yet come, and I was wheeling my bicycle to the side of the lane, there to place it against the hedge and to sit down myself, when the glancing light of the lamp fell on a great red stain that had spread itself, and was still spreading, over the sandy ground in front of me. And I knew on the instant that this was the stain of blood, and I do not think I was surprised when, advancing ...
— Dead Men's Money • J. S. Fletcher
... five foot seven in height, as set forth in this degrading and disgusting document, this blighting bill, this pernicious placard, this abominable advertisement; and with what majesty of denouncement will you crush the viper, who would bring this stain and shame upon the God-like race that happily has cast him out for ever! Yes, my compatriots, happily cast him out and sent him forth! For you remember how he stood here before you on this platform; you remember how, face to face and foot to foot, I pursued ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... Certainly, if the lad had gone homeward, he must have passed this, and he could not pass it without leaving his traces. But no sign of him or the German could be seen. With a darkening face my friend strode along the margin, eagerly observant of every muddy stain upon the mossy surface. Sheep-marks there were in profusion, and at one place, some miles down, cows had left their tracks. ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... if there be a tear, From passion's dross refined and clear; A tear so limpid and so meek, It would not stain an angel's cheek; 'Tis that which pious fathers shed ...
— The Royal Guide to Wax Flower Modelling • Emma Peachey
... Mr. Gaven. "It's getting quite dark, too," and he waved his folded umbrella as though the dusk at least might have had the decency to keep off for a bit. But the dusk came slowly, spreading like a slow stain over the water. Little Jean Scott dragged at ...
— The Garden Party • Katherine Mansfield
... called the freedman to the rescue of his race. The courts of justice received him in witness of his manhood. Before every foreign court he was acknowledged as a citizen of his country, and as entitled to her protection. The capital of our nation was purged of the foul stain that dishonored her in the eyes of the nations, and that gave the lie direct to our most solemn Declaration. The fugitive-slave acts that disfigured our statute-book were blotted out, and fugitive-slave-stealer acts filled their vacant places. The seal of freedom, unconditional, perpetual, and immediate, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 • Various
... beat, again and again, We saw on the moon-pale lintels a splash Of crimson blood like a poppy-stain Or a wild red rose from the gardens of pain That sigh all night like a ghostly sea From the City ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... in an undertone. Madame Jenkins approached, bowing and smiling, while the doctor, stopping a salver as it passed, brought her a glass of bordeaux with the zeal of a mother, an impresario, a lover. Slander, slander, ineffaceable stain! Now Jenkins' attentions seemed overdone to the provincial. He thought that there was something affected, studied in them, and at the same time he fancied that he noticed in the thanks she expressed to her husband in a low tone ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... right about it. We must not let him commit himself to her till he knows the thing that most puts her to shame. It isn't enough for us to say that it was really no shame. She feels that it casts a sort of stain—you know what I mean, Sarah, and I believe I can make this young man know. If I can't, so much the worse for him. He ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... his clothes. One long, thin leg was bent up under the skirts of the overcoat in a queer, twisted way, and the cloth of the trouser leg looked flattened and empty. As Mr. Trimm peered down at him he saw a red stain spreading on the rock under the still, silent ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... family. She was then about twenty years of age, younger than most of the other servants, but in intelligence and in mental qualities their superior. Hira had been known in Govindpur from childhood as a widow, but no one had ever heard anything of her husband, neither had any one heard of any stain upon her character. She was something of a shrew. She dressed and adorned herself as one whose husband is living. She was beautiful, of brilliant complexion, lotus-eyed, short in stature, her face like the moon covered with clouds, her hair raised ...
— The Poison Tree - A Tale of Hindu Life in Bengal • Bankim Chandra Chatterjee
... fearful force some falling Wave Shall wash thee in the wild tempestuous Sea, And in some monster's belly fix thy grave; 20 Or (woful hap!) against some wave-worn rock Which long a Terror to each Bark had stood Shall dash thy mangled limbs with furious shock And stain its craggy sides ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... not need to be stated. He intended that every soldier or sailor who wore the uniform of the United States, be he white, yellow, or black, should not be allowed to sully that uniform and go unpunished. He felt the stain on the service keenly; in spite of denunciation he trusted that the common sense of the Nation would eventually uphold ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... yet I know, When I heard the rallying call, I was one of the very first to go, And ... I'm one of the many who fall: But, as here I lie, it is sweet to feel, That my honor's without a stain;— That I only fought for my Country's weal, And not ...
— Beechenbrook - A Rhyme of the War • Margaret J. Preston
... shadows from the dying candles upon the disordered, abandoned table; she saw the chair pushed back where she had risen to struggle with the bey, the long folds of white cloth, sweeping the floor, behind which Hamdi had rolled so agilely; a stain was still spreading about an upset glass, and from the overturned cooler the ice water was dripping, dripping with a steady, ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... I should do this thing,' he said, 'and flee away from them. If our time be come, let us die manfully for our brethren, and let us not stain our honor.' ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... very sure!" she answered, steadily—"He was a good man. There was never a stain on his character—though he allowed people to think wrong things of him for my sake. That was ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... the bounds of fair and virtuous friendship; for I easily foresaw that if I should have attempted anything in a dishonourable way by force or fraud upon her, I should have thereby brought a wound upon my own soul, a foul scandal upon my religious profession, and an infamous stain upon mine honour; either of which was far more dear unto me than my life. Wherefore, having observed how some others had befooled themselves by misconstruing her common kindness, expressed in an innocent, open, ...
— The History of Thomas Ellwood Written by Himself • Thomas Ellwood
... said; "the stain on my name can never be erased. I am not fit to rule this people. Let them build for me a habitation deep under ground; let them bury my bright treasures in the earth; let them throw the gleaming gold and shining stones into ...
— American Hero-Myths - A Study in the Native Religions of the Western Continent • Daniel G. Brinton
... the only thing in his favour was that his own sword-point was free from stain. His lawyer made the utmost of this, but to no avail. The impression in the court was that both men had been drinking; that they had quarrelled, and that without a duel being fought ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... trampled parts where not a leaf or blade would grow. For a long time, no village girl would dress her hair or bosom with the sweetest flower from that field of death: and after many a year had come and gone, the berries growing there, were still believed to leave too deep a stain upon ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens
... embers of a burned-out past—how was it that that past, at its worst, seemed easier to bear than this intolerable now? How had it come about that a memory of twenty years ago, a memory of how she had prayed that her unborn baby might die, rather than live to remind her of that black stain upon the daylight, its father, had become in the end worse to her, in her heart of hearts, than the thing that caused it? And then she fell to wondering when it was that her child first took hold ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... him; but it was not fear of death that put Cameron on the rack. He had faced death too often to be afraid. It was the thought of adding torture to this long-suffering man. All at once Cameron swore that he would not augment Warren's trouble, or let him stain his hands with blood. He would tell the truth of Nell's sad story and his own, and make ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... smiling again. There is not a shade of hesitation or unreadiness in her low voice, nor does the faintest tinge of color stain the fine pallor ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... corresponding apartment on the other side of the Divan, we were shown a stain of dirt upon the wall, which the zeal of the accusers branded with the imputation of being blood. This room was in a dismantled state, all the furniture having been removed, and the marble flooring torn up in order to search for bones or other ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore
... said these men were Graspum's "men;" they are more-they are a band of outlaws, who boast of living in a free country, where its institutions may be turned into despotism. They carry on a system of trade in human bodies; they stain the fairest spots of earth with their crimes. They set law at defiance-they scoff at the depths of hell that yawn for them,—the blackness of their villainy is known only in heaven. Earth cares little for ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... of the criminal or his advocate, and he be judged to have been in this state when he committed the offence, he shall simply pay for the hurt which he may have done to another; but he shall be exempt from other penalties, unless he have slain some one, and have on his hands the stain of blood. And in that case he shall go to another land and country, and there dwell for a year; and if he return before the expiration of the time which the law appoints, or even set his foot at all on his native land, he shall ...
— Laws • Plato
... cleared up thoroughly, but the main facts are indisputable. Ann Rogers has her own latchkey. As Mrs. Lester usually sat up late, being a lover of books, and seldom stirred before ten o'clock, the maid waited until that hour before bringing her mistress's cup of tea. That stain on the carpet near the door shows where the tray ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... saplings, and presently rose to my knees, blinking about me in a dazed fashion. One thing, however, was evident—any rash move would launch me over the sheer fall. Ormond lay still against the slender trunk, and several minutes passed before he raised his head. There was a red stain on the snow beside him, and ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... sufficient to bring the girl quickly. She appeared in the doorway with downcast eyes and a stain of red in her white cheek. She had a pretty, sad face ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... pleasing to human vanity to believe that one suffers because of one's virtue; but not until a man has extirpated every sickly, bitter, and impure thought from his mind, and washed every sinful stain from his soul, can he be in a position to know and declare that his sufferings are the result of his good, and not of his bad qualities; and on the way to, yet long before he has reached, that supreme perfection, he will have found, working in his mind and life, the Great Law which ...
— As a Man Thinketh • James Allen
... the struggle the Roman commander is said to have shed the last vestiges of international morality, and the reduction of towns by the poisoning of the streams which provided them with water,[536] while it inflicted an indelible stain on Roman honour, was perhaps defended as an inevitable accompaniment of an irregular servile war. The work of organisation had been begun even before that of pacification had been completed. The State ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... records the fact that "Buonarotti having lived for ninety years, there was never found through all that length of time, and with all that liberty to sin, any one who could with right and justice impute to him a stain or any ugliness ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... for instance. They knew nothing about consumption whatever, except that it made people cough; and for two weeks they had been worrying about a coughing-spell of Antanas. It seemed to shake him all over, and it never stopped; you could see a red stain wherever he had spit upon ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... itself,—those were the only memories bequeathed to her by that liaison of two weeks, that loveless sin, wherein not even her pride had succeeded in satisfying itself by the notoriety of a scandal in high life. The fruitless, ineffaceable stain, the senseless fall into the gutter of a woman who cannot walk, and upon whom the ironical pity of the passers-by weighs heavily when ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... photographic developers. I am old enough to remember when we used to develop our plates in ferrous sulfate solution and you never saw nicer negatives than we got with it. But when pyrogallic acid came in we switched over to that even though it did stain our fingers and sometimes our plates. Later came a swarm of new organic reducing agents under various fancy names, such as metol, hydro (short for hydro-quinone) and eikongen ("the image-maker"). Every fellow fixed ...
— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson
... grew in scarlet profusion in the open, until he came to a screen of young jackpines, and through these he quietly and apologetically nosed his way. Then he stood wagging his tail, with Nada sitting on the grass half a dozen steps from him, wiping the strawberry stain from her finger-tips. And the stain was on her red lips, and a bit of it against the flush of her cheek, as she gave a little cry of gladness and greeting to Peter. Her eyes flashed beyond him, and ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... whole spirit of the North on fire. Now the cry was in earnest, "On to Richmond," "Down with the rebellion," "Peace and unity." The Northern press was in a perfect blaze, the men wild with excitement, and every art and device was resorted to to arouse the people to arms. The stain of defeat must now be wiped out; a stigma had been put upon the nation, her flag disgraced, her people dishonored. Large bounties were offered for volunteers, and the recruiting was earnest and energetic. Lincoln called for 300,000 more troops, and ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... forms or states of religion hitherto known, are those in which a healthy humanity, finding in itself many foibles and sins, has imagined, or been made conscious of, the existence of higher spiritual personality, liable to no such fault or stain; and has been assisted in effort, and consoled in pain, by reference to the will or sympathy of such purer spirits, whether imagined or real. I am compelled to use these painful latitudes of expression, because no analysis ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... possibilities in him, but the years of toil had killed them and hardened him. It was for her sake he had made the struggle, and now it seemed unthinkable that she should renounce him because he came to her with the dust and stain of it upon him. For all that, she was possessed with a feeling that she would involve them both in disaster if she yielded. Something warned her ...
— Masters of the Wheat-Lands • Harold Bindloss
... walking beside carts with pitchforks—there's nothing to compare with that here—look at the stony red earth, and the bright blue sea, and the glaring white houses—how tired one gets of it! And the air, without a stain or a wrinkle. I'd give anything for a ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... slew my father, and threw chains o'er me, While I with pious rage pursu'd revenge. I then was young; he plac'd me near his person, And thought me not dishonour'd by his service. One day (may that returning day be night, The stain, the curse, of each succeeding year!) For something, or for nothing, in his pride He struck me. (While I tell it, do I live?) He smote me on the cheek—I did not stab him, For that were poor revenge—E'er since, his folly Has strove ...
— The Revenge - A Tragedy • Edward Young
... partiality for a fortune-hunter no proof? Is it no stain on the character of a modern young lady? Is it no insult to ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... death produced a most intense effect on our troops. At first I feared it would lead to excesses; but now it has softened down, and can easily be guided. None evinced more feeling than General Johnston, who admitted that the act was calculated to stain his cause with a dark hue; and he contended that the loss was most serious to the South, who had begun to realize that Mr. Lincoln was the best friend ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... is that I always get torn,' said Bride dolefully. 'And oh, Alie, there is mamma'—they were down on the shore by this time, coming down being a much speedier affair than climbing up,—'she will be so vexed, for I've got this frock new, extra to yours, you know, because of the stain on the other the day I spilt my tea all down it. I am so sorry, Alie. Could ...
— The Rectory Children • Mrs Molesworth
... that heathen people, in the "olden times," did worship thy deity—Cynthia, Diana, Hecate. Christian Europe invokes thee not by these names now—her idolatry is of a blacker stain: Belial is her God—she ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... depends upon us it shall be done; and whatsoever devoted love of our country and our Commonwealth; whatsoever of our noble and holy principles; whatsoever desire to vindicate our Commonwealth from the stain that has so long rested upon the name may prompt us to do, that we will do, leaving the result to the good ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... and had he murdered her? Look where she would, Lillian saw that question written in fiery letters. What ought she to do? Must she tell Lord Earle, or did the promise she had made bind her in death as well as in life. Nothing could restore her sister. Ought she to tell all she knew, and to stain in death the name ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme
... but suddenly his right arm was raised, some shining object flew from his hand, and there was a crash of glass and instantly a vile odour. On the opposite wall where the bottle had broken appeared a dark and irregular stain. ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... stained and dirty-white hair. A visor, ingeniously made from a large leaf, shielded his eyes, and from under this he peered at the way of his feet on the trail. His beard, which should have been snow-white but which showed the same weather-wear and camp-stain as his hair, fell nearly to his waist in a great tangled mass. About his chest and shoulders hung a single, mangy garment of goat-skin. His arms and legs, withered and skinny, betokened extreme age, as well as did their ...
— The Scarlet Plague • Jack London
... young friends a promise to keep the unsavoury tale to themselves. No good would arise from a publicity which would stain the honour of the army. Besides, Boyce had made good. They have kept their promise like honest gentlemen. I have never, personally, heard further reference to the affair, and of course I have ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... acquitted without a stain on his character. Poor mother's rather sick about it. She thought she'd had a Message, you know. That frightful Ayres woman had a vision in a glass ball of Arthur knocking Oliver downstairs. I expect you heard. Every one did.... Mother went round to see her about it the other ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay
... Guinaud, having directed his attention to the manufacture of flint glass towards the close of last century, at length succeeded, after persevering efforts, in producing masses of that substance perfectly free from stain, and therefore adapted for the construction of the object-glasses ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... bright enough to emphasise the solid whiteness of the snow. But right up against these dreary colours rose the black bulk of the cathedral; and upon the top of the cathedral was a random splash and great stain of snow, still clinging as to an Alpine peak. It had fallen accidentally, but just so fallen as to half drape the dome from its very topmost point, and to pick out in perfect silver the great orb and the cross. When Syme saw it he suddenly straightened himself, and made with his ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... poems contain a great deal that is interesting. The most ambitious is The New Purgatory, to which the book owes its title. It is a vision of a strange garden in which, cleansed and purified of all stain and shame, walk Judas of Cherioth, Nero the Lord of Rome, Ysabel the wife of Ahab, and others, around whose names cling terrible memories of horror, or awful splendours of sin. The conception is fine, but the treatment is hardly ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... softly brown backs, exquisitely ermined by black markings at the root of each feather, following into series of small waves, like little breakers on sand. They have lovely gray chemisettes, striped gray bodices, and green bills and feet; a little orange stain at the root of the green bill, and the bright red iris of the eye have wonderful effect in warming the color of the whole bird: and with beautiful fancy Mr. Gould has put the Stellaris among yellow water-lilies to set off its gray; and a yellow ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin
... utterly unworthy,—takes care to be thoroughly respectable. Full of the desire, but without the pluck, to go altogether wrong, she skirts around the edges of her pet sins, yet having a care that all those who pass by shall see her garments free of stain. ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... bursts the sudden crash, Starts the red flame, and Death pursues the flash.— Fear's feeble hand directs the fiery darts, 250 And Strength and Courage yield to chemic arts; Guilt with pale brow the mimic thunder owns, And Tyrants tremble on their blood-stain'd thrones. ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... all that remained of the boats and men—with the exception of the first boat, which had promptly made off when Hippo turned—was floating down the river, and all the evidences of the fearful occurrence were the excited hippopotamus and the crimson stain in the water caused by the ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... was great, and it kept the sturdy master of La Mariniere standing motionless for a minute or two in a dream, with the open letter in his hand, forgetful alike of the messenger waiting outside, and of his wife behind him at the table. A dark stain of colour stole up into his sunburnt face, his strong mouth quivered, then set itself obstinately. So! this thing was to happen. Treason to Herve, was it? No, it was for his good, for everybody's good. Sentiment was out of place in a political matter ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... another; from which comparison, one or both comes to be denominated"—Locke's Essay, i, 220. "It is not credible, that there hath been any one who through the whole course of their lives will say, that they have kept themselves undefiled with the least spot or stain of sin."—Witsius. "If acting conformably to the will of our Creator;—if promoting the welfare of mankind around us;—if securing our own happiness;—are objects of the highest moment:—then we are loudly called upon to cultivate and extend the great interests of religion and virtue"—Murray's ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... the trance she sudden broke— The trance, or death into promoted life; At her feet a shivered yoke, And in her aspect turned to heaven No trace of passion or of strife— A clear calm look. It spake of pain, But such as purifies from stain— Sharp pangs that never come again— And triumph repressed by knowledge meet, Power dedicate, and hope grown wise, And youth matured for age's seat— Law on her brow and empire in her eyes. So she, with graver air and lifted flag; While the shadow, chased by light, Fled along the far-drawn height, ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville
... A stain of red showed in Maieddine's cheeks, and his eyes lighted up. "They have been watching, expecting us," he said. "Now my father is sending ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... your name free from stain, and your heart open to such noble emotions as awaken tears like those. Ah, by the by, I heard from my lawyer to-day about your poor little protegee. Not found yet, but he seems sanguine of quick success. You shall know the ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... things and sent me a letter; it found me at the Infield Conference the day before I came home that time to see my baby. Since that day it has seemed to me that I would suffer the eternity of the damned rather than that that stain should mar my child's life, and in the blackness of my heart I have believed that it wouldn't if it weren't known. I have kept him quiet; I have hushed up the truth. I have paid him money, leaving it for him where he wrote me to leave it. I have gone hungry and ragged ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... London as at Paris. There is as much difference between the two races as between white and black. In France, the Englishman conforms willingly to our customs, and quickly adopts our manner of acting; but in England we are like a stain on a ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... be a greater mistake than to infer, from the strong expressions in which a devout man bemoans his exceeding sinfulness, that he has led a worse life than his neighbours. Many excellent persons, whose moral character from boyhood to old age has been free from any stain discernible to their fellow-creatures, have, in their autobiographies and diaries, applied to themselves, and doubtless with sincerity, epithets as severe as could be applied to Titus Oates or Mrs Brownrigg. ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 3. (of 4) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... informs me that he has found a quantity of woad growing on the Chilterns above the Thame, enough to stain blue a whole tribe of ancient Britons, and also that on a wall by the roadside between Reading and Pangbourne he discovered several plants of the deadly nightshade, or "dwale." This word is said to be derived ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish
... founded on fact, in McCLURE's MAGAZINE for the current month, is an arraignment of the nineteenth century civilization that, considering its boasts of enlightenment and decency, is as horrible an official crime as any that has given so dark a stain to Russian treatment ...
— McClure's Magazine, March, 1896, Vol. VI., No. 4. • Various
... down entirely on Holt's account. But Holt took him at his word, and carried the books away, and succeeded in persuading Hugh that it was better not to look at volumes which he really almost knew by heart, and every crease, stain, and dog's-ear of which brought up fresh in his mind his old visions of foreign travel and adventure. Then, Holt never encouraged any conversation about the accident with Susan, or with Mr Blake, when they were in the shop; and he never pretended to see that Hugh's lameness was any ...
— The Crofton Boys • Harriet Martineau
... remained on his face was the sadness of a dewy summer twilight, not that of a frosty autumn morn. He, too, had met the Alder-maiden as I, but he had plunged into the torrent of mighty deeds, and the stain was nearly washed away. No shadow followed him. He had not entered the dark house; he had not had time to open the closet door. "Will he ever look in?" I said to myself. "MUST his shadow find him some day?" But I could not answer ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... souvenirs of my sojourn in Golden Chersonese is a bit of amber-colored glass bearing the world-renowned name of a London brewer. There is a dark stain on one side of it that came from the hairy foot of ...
— Tales of the Malayan Coast - From Penang to the Philippines • Rounsevelle Wildman
... mane: A thriving couple here their skill display, And share the profits of no vulgar sway. Third in our Borough's list appears the sign Of a fair queen—the gracious Caroline; But in decay—each feature in the face Has stain of Time, and token of disgrace. The storm of winter, and the summer-sun, Have on that form their equal mischief done; The features now are all disfigured seen, And not one charm adorns th' insulted queen. To this poor ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... love were so fixed in my heart that I might willingly obey him with alacrity and delight, and gradually mortify the power of self-will, passion, and pride. This can only arise from a good hope through grace that we are washed in that precious blood which cleanses us from every sinful stain, and makes us new creatures in Christ. Oh that we may be the happy witnesses of the saving power and virtue of that healing stream which flows from the fountain of ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond
... and political talents, and his bravery in the battle-field, cast additional splendour over the house of Howard; and his violent death, another stain on the tyranny ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 565 - Vol. 20, No. 565., Saturday, September 8, 1832 • Various
... washing off the stain. "It isn't very much of a cut," she said. "I do not think it will ...
— A Dear Little Girl • Amy E. Blanchard
... Fathers, although still held bound by the debt of original sin, in so far as it touches human nature, were nevertheless delivered from all stain of sin by faith in Christ: consequently, they were capable of that deliverance which Christ brought by descending into hell. But the same cannot be said of the children, as is evident from ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... a piece of a torn handkerchief with a deep blood-stain on it," pursued Kennedy. "He said it clearly didn't belong to the murdered man, that it indicated that the murderer had himself been wounded in the tussle, but as yet it had proved utterly valueless as a clue. Would I see what I could ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... sex, that proud submission, that dignified obedience, that subordination of the heart, which kept alive, even in servitude itself, the spirit of an exalted freedom. It is gone, that sensibility of principle, that chastity of honour, which felt a stain like a wound, which inspired courage whilst it mitigated ferocity, which ennobled whatever it touched, and under which vice itself lost half its evil by losing ...
— The World's Greatest Books—Volume 14—Philosophy and Economics • Various
... with all the eloquence of affection and anguish. But he wept and prayed in vain. His young and lovely wife was led to the scaffold, where she met her fate with a pious and even cheerful resignation; but her blood has left a dark stain on the history of the Church of Boston, that no time will ever efface. This dreadful event occurred about forty years after that period of which we ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb
... commenced scourging Jesus with the greatest possible fury; they made use of a different kind of rod,—a species of thorny stick, covered with knots and splinters. The blows from these sticks tore his flesh to pieces; his blood spouted out so as to stain their arms, and he groaned, prayed, and shuddered. At this moment, some strangers mounted on camels passed through the forum; they stopped for a moment, and were quite overcome with pity and horror at the scene before them, ...
— The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ • Anna Catherine Emmerich
... some historians, even at present, when the ancient bigotry is somewhat abated, are desirous of representing this very innocent transaction, in which the king was engaged by the most violent necessity, as a stain on the memory ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... her words were true; And the death of Wiwst will rest on you. You have pledged me as wife to the tall Red Cloud; You will take the gifts of the warrior proud; But I, Wakwa,—I answer—never! I will stain your knife in my heart's red blood, I will plunge and sink in the sullen river, Ere I will be wife ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... were chose, As men who were with mankind foes, And with despite and envy fired, Into the cloister had retired; Or who, in desperate doubt of grace, Strove, by deep penance, to efface Of some foul crime the stain; For, as the vassals of her will, Such men the Church selected still, As either joyed in doing ill, Or thought more grace to gain, If, in her cause, they wrestled down Feelings their nature strove to own. By strange device ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott
... because it was in the river that a brown woman washed his clothes on the stones, returning them with the buttons pounded off; but for every missing button there was sure to be a bright yellow, semi-indelible stain, where the laundress had spread the garments to dry upon a wild ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... not possess: every one with literary tastes was forced to this humiliating admission. Writing from Berlin in 1801, John Quincy Adams hailed the first number of Dennie's Port Folio with delight. "The object," he declared, "is noble. It is to take off that foul stain of literary barbarism which has so long exposed our country to the reproach of strangers and to the derision of our enemies." But the periodical had a very limited circle of readers, and its literary merits were slight. The Anthology and Boston Review, founded in 1805, had ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson
... father's. This was a man, who, under his pleasant exterior of a landed gentleman, was rigid and inflexible. He had already borne a great deal, remember; but this was disgrace, an indelible stain upon a stainless name. Therefore this father, who was at the same time a just and good man, disinherited his favorite child and eldest son. House, slaves, lands, money, the great position of the head of a powerful family, came to Freeman Hynds, my late ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler
... Hostilities with the Castilians and with the Moors occupied many years of his reign, during which he gained some successes; but by consenting to the barbarous murder of Inez de Castro, who was secretly espoused to his son Peter, he has fixed an indelible stain on his character. Enraged at this barbarous act, Peter put himself at the head of an army and devastated the whole of the country between the Douro and the Minho before he was reconciled to his father. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... spectacle beneath it. Eleven of the sons of New England lay stretched upon the street. Some, sorely wounded, were struggling to rise again. Others stirred not, nor groaned, for they were past all pain. Blood was streaming upon the snow; and that purple stain, in the midst of King Street, though it melted away in the next day's sun, was never forgotten ...
— True Stories from History and Biography • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... "name unstained," unless the serious mistakes natural to a sanguine temperament such as his, are to be counted as stains upon his name; and if they are, where among the sons of men would you find many unstained names as noble as his with such a stain upon it? He was not only sensitively honourable in motive, but, when he found what evil his sanguine temper had worked, he used his gigantic powers to repair it, as Samson used his great strength to repair the mischief he had inadvertently done ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... prize-money, and to be dismissed the ship in disgrace. At a quarter past seven in the evening, all hands were mustered aft to hear the sentence read; and after a short but effective address from Captain Semmes, the prisoner was informed that he was now dismissed the Confederate service with the stain of infamy upon him, and bundled over the side into the boat that was to ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... stain of her false position since she had come to the Cape was the overcloud of that accusation which had first warped Sheila Macklin's life and humbled her spirit. She believed that she could never escape the shame of ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper |
