"Temerity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "you are tempting destiny: your temerity be, with all its melancholy consequences, upon ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... entering the world, and looking abroad for a suitable associate, that all are equally vicious, or equally ridiculous; that they who trust are certainly betrayed, and they who esteem are always disappointed; is not to awaken judgment, but to inflame temerity. Without hope there can be no caution. Those who are convinced, that no reason for preference can be found, will never harass their thoughts with doubt and deliberation; they will resolve, since they are doomed to misery, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... exchanged between her and the supplicant at her right. He, wholly elegant, half afraid, bends the knee and fixes her with a regard into which his whole soul is thrown. She, fair lady, is inclining, yet withdrawing, eyes of fear and modesty cast down. Yet whatever of temerity the faces tell, the hands are carrying out a comedy. Hid in the shadow of a copious hat, which the gentleman extends, lurks a rose; proffered by the lady's hand is a token—fair exchange, indeed, of lover's symbols—provided ...
— The Tapestry Book • Helen Churchill Candee
... got into the water under the river bank, and waited for the returning party, and as they passed threw a spear at Scrutton, before any one was aware of his proximity. The audacious savage had much better have left it alone, for he paid for his temerity with his life. Although the travellers came off providentially without hurt, there were many narrow escapes, for which some of them might thank their good fortune. At the commencement of the fight as Alexander Jardine ...
— The Overland Expedition of The Messrs. Jardine • Frank Jardine and Alexander Jardine
... effect are still confounded. Let us carry critical temerity a little further. Scaliger transposed the lines of Virgil's Gallus. Why may not the same experiment be ventured ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson
... accustomed to the modern or Italian style. CLAIRVAL, the first singer at the old Opera Comique, happening to be taken suddenly ill one night, SOLIE undertook his part at a moment's warning. Success crowned his temerity, and from that moment his merit was appreciated. His best character is Micheli in Les deux Savoyards, in which he established his reputation. In the pieces of which MEHUL has composed the music, he shines by the finished ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... landscape before him. In the distance he discerned the ragged tortuous lines that marked the winding course of the hideous gorges which scored the broad plain at intervals—the terrible gorges that had so nearly claimed his life in punishment for his temerity in attempting to invade the ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... here every one sews for herself now. I've even tried writing," and here a crimson glow burned in her cheeks, "but oh, the awful regularity with which everything came back to me. Why, I even put you in a story, Mammy Peggy, you dear old, good, unselfish thing, and the hard-hearted editor had the temerity to decline ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... impatience to doubt, temerity to assever, glory to know, doubt to contradict, end to gain, sloth to search, seeking things in words, resting in a part of nature—these and the like have been the things which have forbidden the happy match between the mind of man and the nature of things, and in ...
— Bacon - English Men Of Letters, Edited By John Morley • Richard William Church
... engaged at work on an upturned canoe. Up the beach was his hut—I have seen many a stye a king to it—and in the doorway his—wife must I call her? Curious I suppose like all her sex she came down the strand to get a look at the white-skinned, light-haired stranger, and was rewarded for temerity in a most summary manner. The man, at first, seemed to expostulate with her, and so far as I could judge, ordered her back to her domicile; but as the lady did not seem prompt to obey the mandate, he further emphasised his meaning and accelerated her movements by flinging a billet of wood ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith
... castle or abbey worth without such appendage?; do tell me candidly, are none of the turrets of your old family mansion in Monmouth rendered thus terrific by some unquiet, wandering spirit?, dare the peasantry pass it after twilight, or if they are forced into that temerity, do not their teeth chatter, their hair stand erect and their poor ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... legion, and chief among them his Royal Highness, and your cousin, Sir Maurice, who has actually had the temerity to enter the field as the Prince's avowed rival; no one but 'Buck' Vibart ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... no one said to me, You do wrong; so I dreamed of sweet words whispered during the dance, and often felt while alone a thrill of joy indescribable yet overpowering when my mind would turn from my studies to remember a piece of temerity of unusual grandeur on the part of one ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... Wager," in which Charles the Second, Nell Gwynn, and the Plague were prominent characters. Accidental circumstances prevented one of the gentlemen from coming with me, and I have often since wondered at my temerity in having placed myself in such a ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... between Faesulae and Arretium, abundant in its supply of corn, cattle, and every other requisite. The consul was haughty from his former consulship, and felt no proper degree of reverence not only for the laws and the majesty of the fathers, but even for the gods. This temerity, inherent in his nature, fortune had fostered by a career of prosperity and success in civil and military affairs. Thus it was sufficiently evident that, heedless of gods and men, he would act in all cases with presumption and precipitation; and, that he might fall the more readily into ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... temerity in having undertaken it. I distrusted my courage. Had I not better retreat, while it was yet time? But there was shame and even difficulty in the thought. How should I appear before my father? Was it not important—had I not deliberately undertaken ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... William Killen, who became chief justice and chancellor of Delaware. Some of the descendants of the Irish redemptioners in Massachusetts are found among the prominent New Englanders of the past hundred years. The Puritans of Massachusetts extended no welcoming hand to the Irish who had the temerity to come among them, yet, as an historical writer has truly said, "by one of those strange transformations which time occasionally works, it has come to pass that Massachusetts today contains more people of Irish blood in proportion to the total population than any ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox
... her husband's works in the biographical edition brought out by Charles Scribner's Sons. As she had but a modest opinion of her abilities, she undertook this work with the greatest reluctance, and in a letter to Mr. Scribner she remarks, "It appalls me to think of my temerity in writing these introductions." Yet I believe that everyone who reads them will feel that a new and personal interest has been added to each one of his books by her graphic story of the circumstances ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... offering up his life in its defense, and he spared to carry home the news of an unmarked grave on a Southern battle-field. It was a privilege to him to offer his assistance and counsel to-day to a daughter of an old comrade, and any one who had the temerity to offer an affront to this witness would be held to a ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... impetuosity which stamped all his actions, accompanied only by his body-guard, he committed himself into the hands of his enemy, whom he forthwith carried away with him, leaving a governor behind to hold the town for the Church. All prudent men who were with the Pope remarked on his temerity, and on the pusillanimity of Giovanpagolo; nor could they conjecture why the latter had not, to his eternal glory, availed himself of this opportunity for crushing his enemy, and at the same time enriching himself with plunder, ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli
... to his countrymen, which has effectually cured them of meddling with tiger-whelps. On another occasion, a China-man, having set a trap for tigers, took a walk out about midnight, to see if his plan had been successful. He paid dearly for his temerity, being carried off by some prowling monster; and his mangled body was found near the ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson
... swarmed around the troops, attacking them in front, flank, and rear, pouring in their fire from every point of vantage, slaying them in hundreds, in thousands, as they moved hopelessly on. The despairing men fought bravely. Many of the foe suffered for their temerity. But they were like prairie-wolves around the dying bison; the retreating force lay helpless in their hands; two new foes took the place of every ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... before that old age had very little of Mr. Johnson's reverence. "A man commonly grew wickeder as he grew older," he said, "at least he but changed the vices of youth; headstrong passion and wild temerity, for treacherous caution, and desire to circumvent. I am always," said he, "on the young people's side, when there is a dispute between them and the old ones, for you have at least a chance for virtue till age has ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... Caseaux was in an ecstasy for an hour, and began to prophesy. Another day, M. Olinde Rodrigues was struck as if by apoplexy; because, asking each of the members in turn whether it was not true that the Holy Spirit was in him, (M. Olinde Rodrigues,) one of the persons interrogated had the temerity to answer by certain expressions of incredulity. The fit was extremely violent, and Dr Fuster, in order to save the patient, had recourse to a formal retractation from the inconsiderate respondent, who, on his part, was full of affliction ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... but an army of well-trained troops will spring like magic to the field, ready to march at once to victory, without the necessity of 'camps of instruction' and twelve months' delays. And when that day does come, woe to that potentate who shall have the temerity to provoke a war with our race of soldiers: his legions will be swept away like chaff before the whirlwind, and only defeat and disgrace will settle ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... kindly respectable people, as you'll see in a day or two for yourself. My father and sisters will do themselves the honour to wait upon you," the young man announced with a temerity the sense of which made ...
— The Reverberator • Henry James
... subterranean tombs so dangerous to explorers. The deceased gentleman had, with inexplicable rashness, made his way into this labyrinth without, as far as can be discovered, taking with him either candles or matches, so that his sad fate was the natural result of his own temerity. What makes the matter more painful is that Dr. Julius Burger was an intimate friend of the deceased. His joy at the extraordinary find which he has been so fortunate as to make has been greatly marred by the terrible fate of his comrade ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... young middy, to the horror of the spectators, thrust his hand into the jaws of the animal, who, no doubt, was taken as much by surprise as the lookers-on. It was a daring feat; but providentially he did not suffer for his temerity."[143] This reminds the biographer of Nelson's feat with the polar bear, and of Charles Napier's (the soldier) bold adventure with an eagle in his boyhood, as related by Sir William Napier in the history of his ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... stand virtually ... impugned by proclamation, I am neither the sycophant nor the renegade to crouch down under unmerited imputations, come from whence they may, even though I should suffer imprisonment and ruin for my temerity. ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... had scarcely dared to approach, even with awe, the thought of such a possibility for herself. As in the past she had not had the temerity to dream of herself as a woman who possessed attractions likely to lead to marriage, so she was mentally restrained in these days. There was something spinster-like in the tenor of her thoughts. But she would have laid down her life for this dull man's happiness. And of late she had more than ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... services of knowledge to private virtue, it takes away all levity, temerity, and insolence by copious suggestion of all doubts and difficulties, and acquainting the mind to balance reasons on both sides. It takes away vain admiration of anything, which is the root of all weakness. No man can marvel at the play of puppets that goes behind the curtain. And certainly, if ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various
... by a hurried hand. What name was it that had been in those hundreds of volumes? For what reason had it been so carefully removed? The girl had often speculated thereon, and fitted theory after theory; but never yet, wilful as she was, had she had the temerity to ask the only person who ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... Mr. Slope, felt at the present rather abashed. He hardly knew how to frame his little request in language sufficiently modest. He had recognized and acknowledged to himself the necessity of shocking the bishop in the first instance by the temerity of his application, and his difficulty was how best to remedy that by his adroitness and eloquence. "I doubted myself," said he, "whether your lordship would have anyone immediately in your eye, and it is on this account that ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... short-sighted temerity. With one long howl of utter dismay and deadly fear, he manages to get away from the pack, leaving my little doggies to come proudly round my horse with their mouths full of fur, and each of their little tails as stiff as an ...
— Sport and Work on the Nepaul Frontier - Twelve Years Sporting Reminiscences of an Indigo Planter • James Inglis
... feminine confidence that I place my services at your disposal, and, my information being of the most unreliable description (derived invariably from the owners), I feel sure that those of your readers who follow my tips will have no cause to regret their temerity, as, being like all women, nothing if not original, I intend to tip, not the probable winner, but the probable last ...
— Punch Volume 102, May 28, 1892 - or the London Charivari • Various
... reading the paragraph over your shoulder. Nor is it unnatural that one should grow doubtful of reported Cuban victories if he reads of the taking of Santa Clara and the flight of the Spanish garrison from that city, when he is living at Santa Clara and cannot find a Cuban in it with sufficient temerity to assist him to get out of it ...
— Cuba in War Time • Richard Harding Davis
... looking at the girl. Why should there be that lurking horror and hostility in her eyes? What had Sprudell told her? On a sudden desperate impulse and before Sprudell could stop him, he walked up to her and asked doggedly, though his temerity made ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart
... the treatment he had received at the hands of the doctor. As for Sulkowsky, he had been killed and beheaded before his eyes, so it was useless to think more of him. Roland resumed his duties, but it was noticeable his native courage had become temerity, and his longing for glory, desire ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... wouldn't have done any good had the old stage-driver heard it. At the end of the lane, he knew in a few moments they would all arrive at a big old fashioned mansion where shelter could not be refused them under such circumstances. Although,—and Mr. Kimball shook within himself at his temerity,—under any other conditions visitors would not be expected nor welcomed. For Mr. John Clemcy and his sister, Miss Ophelia, had never exhibited, since they settled down in this quiet spot after leaving their English home many years ago, any apparent ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... was, by gum, the first time I called here," broke in Byle, whose unconscious temerity Blennerhassett, not being able to rebuke, had concluded to tolerate. "I have fetched you a lot more plants and roots, and the spines of that big cat-fish I told you about. Here's another curiosity—the wing of a queer bird that I don't know—maybe you will—I shot the fowl flying. ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... the Millerite excitement was at white heat. Some of the preachers in other parts of the country had set one day, some another. I believe that Mr. Miller, the founder, never had the temerity to set a day. But his followers figured the thing more closely, and Elder Hankins had put a fine point on the matter. He was certain, for his part, that the time was at midnight on the eleventh of August. His followers became ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston
... monstrous shock for me and a most miserable cold douche of temerity over my proud aristocrat's heart when at such a moment, my temptress having struck a match on the wall, the brightly flickering flame suddenly lit up the satanic visage of brother Michael, who, after first having leered at ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden
... It required great temerity to so abandon themselves to the impulse of these furious waves which precipitated them into the abyss; but this momentary submersion was more frightful than dangerous; the mouth of the cave was so large that there was no danger of being bruised by the rocks, ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... negotiations until Englishman and American met on equal terms as the representatives of equal nations, and dared to break the specific instructions of Congress when he believed France favoured confining the United States between the Atlantic and the Alleghanies, would have had the temerity to take Canada, had the great foresight been his to discern the irritating annoyances to which its ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... experience," he drawled, "that temerity is born, if not of curiosity, then of ignorance. Now, if there is one vice more than another which I deplore, it is temerity—especially when it is displayed by a host at two o'clock of a morning. I am therefore ...
— Berry And Co. • Dornford Yates
... guingon habits. The senior sacristan made a small fortune selling—or giving away as alms, we should say—all things necessary for the salvation of the soul and the warfare against the devil, as it is well known that this spirit, which formerly had the temerity to contradict God himself face to face and to doubt His words, as is related in the holy book of Job, who carried our Lord Christ through the air as afterwards in the Dark Ages he carried the ghosts, and continues, according to report, to carry the asuang of the ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... perhaps by his "glossy, unfeeling diction"—there is not one of them who overstepped the bounds marked out for literary effort by the prevailing taste of the Augustan age, in its narrowest sense, without paying the price for his temerity in the sneers or reprobation of Johnson. Collins, it is true, escapes more lightly than the rest; but that is probably due to the affection and pity of his critic. Yet even Collins, perhaps the most truly poetic spirit of the century between Milton and Burns, is blamed for a "diction ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... thought it necessary to show himself as intolerantly strict in form as he was licentious in practice. He forbade the burial of a comedian's remains. Madame Moliere went to throw herself at the feet of Louis XIV., but with impolitic temerity her petition stated, that if her deceased husband had been criminal in composing and acting dramatic pieces, his majesty, at whose command and for whose amusement he had done so, must be criminal also. This argument, though in itself unanswerable, was too bluntly stated to be favorably ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... against the Caesar, vaguely demanding vengeance for wrongs unstated, had not gone to rest. Like the gale a while ago they had merely drawn back in their fury, quiescent for a while, but losing neither strength nor temerity. Dull cries still resounded from afar. "Death to the Caesar!" was still the rallying cry, though it came now subdued by distance, and the majestic screens of stately temples interposed between it and the towering heights of ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... the subject were dispelled by the occurrence of a most extraordinary phenomenon just at this stage of the affair, which was understood by all to be a divine judgment upon Laocoon for his sacriligious temerity in striking his spear into the horse's side. It had been determined to offer a sacrifice to Neptune. Lots were drawn to determine who should perform the rite. The lot fell upon Laocoon. He began to make preparations ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... true, lest some such fate as Ustani's might punish me for my temerity, but for reasons which doubtless seemed sufficient to himself the wizard merely looked at me through his veil, shook himself a little in his swathings, and said in a matter-of-fact voice, 'Well, well, perhaps we have had enough of such talk as this. Let's get ahead with the business before ...
— HE • Andrew Lang
... Archbishop and Prince Elector of Treves not only permits witches and magicians to be subjected to deserved punishment in his diocese, but has also ordained laws regulating the mode and cost of the procedure against witches, thereby with inconsiderate temerity tacitly insinuating the charge of tyranny against the said Elector of Treves. 5. Item. I revoke and condemn these following conclusions, to wit, that there are no such beings as sorcerers, who renounce God and worship ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... a short one, I will tell you another of a lucky escape I witnessed; though first I should mention that soon after this affair my friend paid with his life for the temerity with which he ...
— Harper's Young People, April 20, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... principles of these most uncouth philosophies, expressed, we verily believe, in the darkest language ever used by civilised man, are applied to the solution of the problems of theology and ethics, no wonder that the natural consequence, as well as just retribution, of such temerity is a plunge into tenfold night. Systems of German philosophy may perhaps be advantageously studied by those who are mature enough to study them; but that they have an incomparable power of intoxicating the intellect of the young aspirant to their mysteries, ...
— Reason and Faith; Their Claims and Conflicts • Henry Rogers
... kept the rhythm and sonorous sound which is far removed from prose. That was the period when there was nothing but praise for Alfred Ernst's gibberish, though that was an insult alike to the French language and the masterpieces he had the temerity to translate. Gallet used the same blank verse in Dejanire, although its use here was more debatable, but he handled it with surprising skill. Now that this text has been set to music, it shows ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... his temerity That Cam-u-el's posterity Must wear divided upper lips through all their solemn lives! A prodigy astonishing Reproachfully admonishing Those, wicked, heartless married men who ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... this over, I find all I seem to have done in it is to complain because no one, but yourself and myself liked "Macklin." What I wanted to say is, that I am very grateful for the article, for the appreciation, although I don't deserve it, and for your temerity in saying so many kind things. Nothing that has been written about what I have written has ever pleased me ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... that rode off on the horse your husband or lover that you take his part?" asked Bill, half angrily and half wondering at the temerity of the lovely girl who thus ...
— Wild Bill's Last Trail • Ned Buntline
... afterwards a female elephant, with three young ones, charged through, the centre of their extended line, when the men, throwing down their burdens, retreated in a great hurry, she receiving a spear for her temerity. ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... therefore in peace, without farther delay, for I must myself perish if you remain any longer. I am persuaded that your presence brings misfortune with it. Depart, and take care never to appear again in my dominions. No consideration whatever shall hinder me from making you repent your temerity should you violate my injunction." I was going to speak, but he prevented me by words full of anger; and I was obliged to quit the palace, rejected, banished, an outcast from the world. Before I left the ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 1 • Anon.
... instantly beside her, but she stood in the doorway, and barred his further progress with her extended staff. Now that he was face to face with her, he wondered at his own temerity. There was nothing human in her countenance, and infernal light gleamed in her strangely-set eyes. Her personal strength, evidently unimpaired by age, or preserved by magical art, seemed equal to her malice; and she appeared ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... in England, Zwingli in Switzerland, the Waldenses in Italy, and the Albigenses in France, had raised their voices in solemn protest against clerical abuses,[52] and many of the reformers had paid for their temerity by martyrdom. But the German Reformation, under the leadership of Martin Luther, was destined to exert a mighty influence throughout northern Europe, and to set in motion impulses which were ...
— History of Education • Levi Seeley
... unless fostered by human care.[37-1] What numberless ages does this suggest? How many centuries elapsed ere man thought of cultivating Indian corn? How many more ere it had spread over nearly a hundred degrees of latitude, and lost all semblance to its original form? Who has the temerity to answer these questions? The judicious thinker will perceive in them satisfactory reasons for dropping once for all the vexed inquiry, "how America was peopled," and will smile at its imaginary solutions, whether they suggest Jews, ...
— The Myths of the New World - A Treatise on the Symbolism and Mythology of the Red Race of America • Daniel G. Brinton
... neither Barbara nor Nona had the temerity to follow them. But this did not mean that they were not both extraordinarily curious. At least they strained their ears as much as possible in order to try and catch a stray word spoken either by Mildred or her companion. But they heard nothing except the low murmur of the two voices, ...
— The Red Cross Girls with the Russian Army • Margaret Vandercook
... some servant, and went into the library where there was a little staircase that led thence to the second floor. The count proceeded on tiptoe with a beating heart. Although this was not the first time he had been like this to the Quinones' house, it always seemed to him the height of temerity, and he inwardly cursed his lover's boldness and disregard ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... following year, and his persecutions of his enemies in England gave good citizens to America. But the Virginians, who could be wronged and oppressed, but never crushed, protested against the arbitrary use of the king's prerogative; they were punished for their temerity, but rose more determined from the struggle. No man could be sent to Virginia who was strong enough to destroy ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... did not quite understand that it was the desire to confide in and confess to his friend what had actuated his choice of moral trails. But the yearning was there, and he was yielding to it. He conjectured shrewdly that Long might not dream that he would have the temerity again to enter the very district where he was being sought. It was his belief that the best place to hide from a posse was in ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... been generally divided into six different satires, but by some only into five. The subjects of these compositions are, the vanity of the poets in his time; the backwardness of youth to the cultivation of moral science; ignorance and temerity in political administration, chiefly in allusion to the government of Nero: the fifth satire is employed in evincing that the wise man also is free; in discussing which point, the author adopts the observations used by Horace on the same subject. The last satire ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... 118 must be regarded as almost devoid of air, of occupied by an atmosphere that does not even contain 1/100000th part of oxygen. The recent investigations of Biot on the important phenomenon of twilight* have considerably lowered the lines which had, perhaps with some degree of temerity, been usually termed the boundaries of the atmosphere; but processes of light may be evolved independently of the presence of oxygen, and Poisson conjectured that aroliteswere ignited far beyond the range of our atmosphere. Numerical calculation and geometrical ...
— COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 • Alexander von Humboldt
... to adapt. The numerous class of persons who believed that the Ottoman Porte had consented to our occupation of Egypt were suddenly undeceived. It, was then asked how we could, without that consent, have attempted such an enterprise? Nothing, it was said, could justify the temerity of such an expedition, if it should produce a rupture between France, the Ottoman empire, and its allies. However, for the remainder of the year Bonaparte dreaded nothing except an expedition from Gaza and El-Arish, of which the troops of Djezzar had already taken possession. ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... all his progeny, down to the little bare-legged imitation Highlander on a shaggy Shetland pony; then a riding-master in mustachios, boots, and breeches, with a dozen pupils in divers stages of timidity and full-blown temerity; and then again loving pairs in the process of courtship or the ecstasies of the honeymoon, pacing or racing along, indifferent to the interest and admiration that such pairs always excite. Besides the groups there are single figures, military and civil, on prancing thorough-bred ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... you one for next fall, Hippy," said Anne, with a sudden temerity which surprised her ...
— Grace Harlowe's Return to Overton Campus • Jessie Graham Flower
... seen how, in the beginning of the year, the Sun had prophesied the marriage of the Queen and Prince Albert, for which it was duly pooh-poohed by the Times—but on 22 Aug., the Morning Post had the dreadful temerity to announce the same—and the Court Circular of 11 Oct. tells us, that "The Hereditary Prince (Ernest) and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, landed at the Tower, at 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon, from the Continent. Their Serene Highnesses ...
— Gossip in the First Decade of Victoria's Reign • John Ashton
... the temerity and audacity of foolish and worthless men was violating a most honourable and virtuous system, to the excessive injury of the republic, the more studiously did it become others to resist them, and to consult the welfare ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero
... on the covered benches, exposed to the eyes of the mob; and, which is worse, to the cold, raw, night-air, devouring sliced beef, and swilling port, and punch, and cyder, I can't help compassionating their temerity; white I despise their want of taste and decorum; but, when they course along those damp and gloomy walks, or crowd together upon the wet gravel, without any other cover than the cope of Heaven, listening to a song, ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... passed, Stella counting the seconds with a throbbing heart. Monck did not raise his eyes or stir, but there was to her something dreadful in his utter stillness. She marvelled at Tessa's temerity. ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... down the Channel for some weeks on the look-out for the Spaniards, and on September 16 he sighted the armada. He had only thirteen vessels with him, the larger part of his fleet having been detached to keep watch and ward over Dunkirk. With a boldness, however, that might have been accounted temerity, Tromp at once attacked the enemy and with such fury that the Spanish fleet sought refuge under the lee of the Downs and anchored at the side of an English squadron under Vice-Admiral Pennington. Rejoined by seventeen ships from before Dunkirk, the ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson
... the importunities of a new desire. Yet, since the fear of missing what we seek must always be proportionable to the happiness expected from possessing it, the passions, even in this tempestuous state, might be somewhat moderated by frequent inculcation of the mischief of temerity, and the hazard of losing that which we endeavour to ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... Rashness. — N. rashness &c. adj.; temerity, want of caution, imprudence, indiscretion; overconfidence, presumption, audacity. precipitancy, precipitation; impetuosity; levity; foolhardihood[obs3], foolhardiness; heedlessness, thoughtlessness &c. (inattention) 458; carelessness &c. (neglect) 460; desperation; Quixotism, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... vicious cur, with a mere rag of a tail, crept round by the back of the tent, and, coming upon Crusoe in the rear, snapped at his tail sharply, and then fled shrieking with terror and surprise, no doubt, at its own temerity. ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne
... mind, I suggested to Frances and Betty that I cross to Calais alone, regardless of the weather, leaving them at Dover till my return. But they would not be left behind, so we all set sail on a blustery morning and paid for our temerity with a day of suffering. In Calais we posted our letters, having learned that a messenger would leave that same day for Paris, and two days ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... indifference! Yet kind, heavenly kind even in her coldness! Her cheerful eye never turns from me, nor ever seeks me. To her I am a statue—Would I were! Why does she not hate me? Openly and absolutely hate me!—And could I wish her to love? Do I love? Do I? Dare I? Have I the temerity so much as to suspect I love?—Who am I? ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... the temerity of the man. Bishop Chuff, the fanatical leader of the Anti-Everything League—jocosely known as the Pan-Antis—was the most feared man in America. It was he whose untiring organization had forced prohibition through the legislatures ...
— In the Sweet Dry and Dry • Christopher Morley
... nearly twice as much time—and time, in itself, is the most valuable thing in the world. Considered from this angle, it seems incredible that we have no connoisseurs of sleep. For we have none. Therefore it is with some temerity that I declare sleep to be one of the romances of existence, and not by any chance the simple necessary it is ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... of the undertaking!—You will see a few hapless wretches, and tell their condition to the inattentive world; perhaps perish yourself from contagion, before you have time to tell it; and leave your afflicted friends to lament your untimely fate, and the ungrateful Publick to deride your temerity!' What force of intellect, what dignity of soul were required to prevent a mortal from yielding to remonstrances so engaging! The divine energy of Genius and of Virtue enabled HOWARD to foresee, that the sanctity of his pursuit would supply him ...
— The Eulogies of Howard • William Hayley
... to powerlessness to help opprest innocence? What good can come of the sterile regrets, these illusory reparations you grant to a vain shade, to insensible ashes? They are the sad testimonials of the barbarous temerity of your penal laws. To rob the man of the possibility of expiating his crime by his repentance or by acts of virtue; to close to him without mercy every return toward a proper life, and his own esteem; to hasten his ...
— Phrases for Public Speakers and Paragraphs for Study • Compiled by Grenville Kleiser
... iodine, in different parts of a public or private deed, give rise to a suspicion, where these stains have, perhaps, been occasioned by the spilling of some liquid on the surface of the paper? and would it not be rash and unjust to raise an accusation from such a fact? There would indeed be great temerity in drawing such a conclusion from a fortuitous circumstance; but the inference which may be drawn from the place occupied by these stains on the surface of the paper, from the more or less significant words found in those places, would not permit an accusation to be so lightly brought, where ...
— Forty Centuries of Ink • David N. Carvalho
... I inquired, almost without knowing what I said. I was as surprised as he was at such temerity. For an instant he did not know what I meant. 'Gladys,' said he. 'Who the——Oh! now I remember——I don't know. Yes,' he went on, turning back to the fire, 'I remember now, Charley. I don't suppose I looked very well from ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... the clergyman and myself. It was arranged finally that the lectures should be delivered, and that one of them should be delivered by me. I need not say how pleasant was the writing out of my discourse, and how the pleasure was heightened by the slightest thrill of alarm at my own temerity. My lecture I copied out in my most careful hand, and, as I had it by heart, I used to declaim passages of it ensconced in my moss-house, or concealed behind my shrubbery trees. In these places I tried it all over, sentence by sentence. The evening came at last which had been looked forward ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... and quite as much amazed at her own temerity as Mr. Anstruther was; "I don't think I am ashamed, grandfather. You see, I am very fond of Eleanor Humphreys. She has been a very great ...
— The Rebellion of Margaret • Geraldine Mockler
... of you may say, "The evidence of spiritual verity in me is so small that I am afraid. I feel so far from victory over the flesh that to reach out for a present realization of my hope savors of temerity. Because of my own unfitness for such a spiritual animus my strength is naught, and my faith fails." O thou "weak and infirm of purpose." Jesus said, ...
— Pulpit and Press (6th Edition) • Mary Baker Eddy
... grateful for such sentiments; furthermore, they might have needed their protection any day. By being nice to them they would possibly have fewer men billeted to their houses. And why hurt the feelings of a man who had full power over them? To act in that way would be less bravery than temerity—and temerity is no longer a failing of the citizens of Rouen, as in the days of heroic defense when their City became famous. Last of all—supreme argument derived from French urbanity—they said that they could allow themselves to be polite in their own houses, provided they did not exhibit in ...
— Mademoiselle Fifi • Guy de Maupassant
... yard was the adjoining garden of a pawn shop called Yamashiro-ya. This shopkeeper's son was a boy about 13 or 14 years old named Kantaro. Kantaro was, it happens, a mollycoddle. Nevertheless he had the temerity to come over the fence to our yard and ...
— Botchan (Master Darling) • Mr. Kin-nosuke Natsume, trans. by Yasotaro Morri
... ignorant of most of the dangers to which Dolores exposed herself, or who knew of them only when it was too late to blame her for her temerity, had not lost sight of the motives which had induced him to accompany the girl ...
— Which? - or, Between Two Women • Ernest Daudet
... was the only one of them seated. Their heads were covered by veils which had the appearance of finely woven silver. This jealous precaution, of course, cut off recognition; nevertheless such of the audience as had the temerity to cast their eyes at the fair array were consoled by a view of jewelled hands, bare arms inimitably round and graceful, and figures in drapery of delicate colors, and of designs to tempt the imagination without offence to modesty—a respect in which the Greek ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... proud and jubilant to scold him for his temerity, and stood smiling at her gate, calling to the neighbours to "Jest see our Gaffer! Theer, he's gone an' oppened window all hissel', an's lookin' out same's ony ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)
... the losses and depression caused by its defeat at Franklin, ready to attack an inferior force at Nashville or to cross the Cumberland and invade Kentucky. In short, the day gained at Duck River and Spring Hill was indispensable to Thomas's success. The time gained by that "temerity" made success possible. The additional time and relative strength gained by Hood's disastrous repulse at Franklin made final success easy and certain. A retreat at any time before nine o'clock A. M. on the ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... Poem is founded upon a Spanish Tradition, bearing, in general, that Don Roderick, the last Gothic King of Spain, when the invasion of the Moors was depending, had the temerity to descend into an ancient vault, near Toledo, the opening of which had been denounced as fatal to the Spanish Monarchy. The legend adds, that his rash curiosity was mortified by an emblematical representation of those Saracens who, in the year ...
— Some Poems by Sir Walter Scott • Sir Walter Scott
... in one. At that time measures of an arduous and critical nature ought to have been forborne, even if, to the fullest council, this specific measure had not been prohibited by the superior authority. It was in this very situation that one man had the hardiness to conceive and the temerity to execute a total revolution in the form and the persons composing the government of a great kingdom. Without any previous step, at one stroke, the whole constitution, of Bengal, civil and criminal, was swept away. The counsellors were recalled from their provinces; upwards of fifty of ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... with his courage and coolness, but, knowing his real rank, were not so much astonished as the other spectators of this extraordinary scene, who were both shocked and amazed at such temerity. ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... squadron, consisting of the monitor Amphitrite, the protected cruiser Cincinnati and the Leyden. No time was lost in landing men to support the lighthouse force, and to open fire from the ships. The Spaniards were driven back and suffered much from their foolish temerity. ...
— Porto Rico - Its History, Products and Possibilities... • Arthur D. Hall
... to embrace her in warm comfort, and reveal her in a new and sprightly loveliness. Her rippled hair was free upon her temples, her ear peeped out from beneath it with a roguish tint upon it, as if it waited to be kissed, and blushed for its own temerity. A gay little highland bonnet rode the brown billows of her abundant hair, saucy and bold as a corsair, with one bright little feather at its prow. Perhaps it was no more than a goose quill, or a cock's plume dipped in dye, but to Joe it seemed as glorious as if it had ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... Some die of consumption, others become mystics, some marry widowed squadron-commanders, some still try to stand firm, but are obviously losing heart. Probably the first tailors and the first astrologers also died out rapidly. Life is hard on those who have the temerity first to enter upon an unknown path. The vanguard always has a bad time ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... profitable engagements. But the great opportunity of his life came to him in Bologna. The people had thronged to the opera house to hear Malibran. She had disappointed them, and they were in no mood to be lenient to the unknown violinist who had the temerity to try to ...
— Eclectic School Readings: Stories from Life • Orison Swett Marden
... family, from generation to generation, since the days of Hercules. Several kings, from time to time, have caused the gate to be thrown open, and have attempted to enter, but have paid dearly for their temerity. Some have perished within the threshold, others have been overwhelmed with horror at tremendous sounds, which shook the foundations of the earth, and have hastened to re-close the door, and secure it with its thousand locks. Thus, since the days of Hercules, the inmost recesses ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various
... presence of that terrible woman alone, at the dead hour of night! she had spoken bold and presumptuous words to that strange being whom even her own people hardly dared to approach uncalled for! Sick with terror at the consequences of her temerity, Catharine cast her trembling arms about the sleeping Indian girl, and, hiding her head in her bosom, wept and prayed till sleep came over her wearied spirit. It was late when she awoke. She was alone; the lodge was empty. A vague fear seized her: she hastily arose to seek her friend. It was ...
— Lost in the Backwoods • Catharine Parr Traill
... mean time, Dr. Elliotson and M. Dupotet continued the public exhibition at the hospital; while the credulous gaped with wonder, and only some few daring spirits had temerity enough to hint about quackery and delusion on the part of the doctors, and imposture on the part of the patients. The phenomena induced in two young women, sisters, named Elizabeth and Jane Okey, were so extraordinary that they became ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... on. He had a feeling of temerity, but then it seemed as if God within him bade him ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells
... men who had not yet fallen in the hands of the reckless Georgians had distanced me, and the only energy that kept me to the race was the hope that some mishap might befall the wild-eyed man in my rear, otherwise I was gone. No one would have the temerity to tackle the giant in his rage. But all things must come to an end, and my race ended by falling in my tent, more dead than alive, just as I felt the warm breath of my pursuer blowing on my neck. I heard, as I lay panting, the wild-eyed ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... as ever, and the closest examination of the weapon gave no hint pertaining to the purport of the message. Yet it is probable that Wilhelm was the only noble in the German Empire who was ignorant of the significance of the four letters, and doubtless the senders were amazed at his temerity in nonchalantly ignoring the repeated warnings, which would have brought pallor to the cheeks of the highest in the land. Wilhelm had been always so dependent on the advice of Gottlieb that it never occurred to him to seek explanation from any one else, yet in this instance Gottlieb, ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... openly or secretly, of the Church; and he hoped, even at the eleventh hour, that he might recall their lost allegiance. Alone, with a cross uplifted in his hand, he stood at the door of the monastery to meet the Norsemen. The fierce band paused in amazement at the sight of his temerity; it was something those savage men had not known before. The swift rush through the battlefield of the warrior who hoped by slaughter to gain Valhalla, they could understand; but this calm courage in the face of death was beyond their experience. Kolgan ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... the bold face of his passenger, in a manner to betray how much his mind misgave the result. But the tail mariner maintained his coolness, and began to make merry allusions to the service which he had braved with so much temerity, and from which no one believed he was yet likely to escape. By the former manoeuvres, the periagua had gained a position well to windward of the wharf; and she was now steered close upon the wind, directly for the shore. Against ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... confused, alarmed, and extremely ashamed. Her mood had changed in a flash. It seemed to her that she was in presence of a disgraceful disaster, which she herself had brought about by wicked and irresponsible temerity. She was like a child who, having naughtily trifled with danger, stands aghast at the calamity which his perverseness has caused. She was positively affrighted. She reflected in her terror: "I asked for this, and I've ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... penalty which has received undue public prominence of late is called prayaschitta, which means atonement. It is usually applied as punishment to those who have had the temerity to cross the ocean for foreign travel, business, or study. More correctly, it is rather a process of cleansing and ceremonial rehabilitation than an act of punishment. The exclusiveness of caste delighted in calling all foreigners Mlechhas, which, though perhaps not as vigorous a term ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones
... done with the same approbation as if they were sober; they hesitate, and often recall themselves, and frame a weaker judgment of what they see[13]." But had he consulted experience, he would have found that drunkenness, far from making people fearful, inspires them with boldness and temerity. ...
— Ebrietatis Encomium - or, the Praise of Drunkenness • Boniface Oinophilus
... writes:—“Greatly as I admired Johnson’s talents and revered his knowledge, and formidable as I felt the powers to be of his witty sophistry, yet did a certain quickness of spirit, and zeal for the reputation of my favourite authors, irresistibly urge me to defend them against his spleenful injustice—a temerity, which I was well aware made him dislike me, notwithstanding the coaxing regard he always expressed for me on his first salutations on returning to Lichfield.” Again, in other letters, she says:—. . . “I have had frequent opportunities of conversing ...
— Anna Seward - and Classic Lichfield • Stapleton Martin
... at the crouching white shape, and the full temerity of my voyage came suddenly upon me. What might appear when that hazy curtain was altogether withdrawn? What might not have happened to men? What if cruelty had grown into a common passion? What if in this interval the race had lost its manliness and had developed ...
— The Time Machine • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... hardship, unless—and here the suggestion of Mr. Pomeroy occurred to him—unless he ran away. He had known of boys doing this before. Some had been brought back, and, of course, were punished severely for their temerity, but others had escaped, and had never returned. What had become of them Phil did not know, but he rightly concluded that they could not be any worse off than in the service of the padrone. Thinking of all this, Phil began to think it probable that he, too, would some day break ...
— Phil the Fiddler • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... from despising the softer feelings of tenderness; pride takes its origin from the disdain of compliance; and the first step to avarice is the desire of avoiding profusion. Inconveniencies similar to these are the consequences of temerity in canvassing the subjects of speculation. The mind of an Author receives an early bias from prepossession, and the dislike which he conceives to a particular fault precipitates him at once to the opposite extreme. For this reason perhaps it is, that young authors who possess some degree ...
— An Essay on the Lyric Poetry of the Ancients • John Ogilvie
... our withdrawing, without firing a shot, would produce an effect upon the minds of the Spaniards the reverse of that intended. I had sufficient experience in war to know that moral effect, even if the result of a degree of temerity, will not unfrequently supply the place of ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald
... remonstrance, nor offer one word of sympathy. His neighbours accepted the fact as they accepted McWhorter—with respect. If they wondered, they continued to wonder, for so far as anyone knew nobody had ever had the temerity to seek knowledge at its ...
— Prairie Flowers • James B. Hendryx
... the Landers found its way into those of their opponents. This mode of proceeding was not relished by them at all, and Richard Lander's gun being loaded with two balls and four slugs, he took deliberate aim at the leader, and he would have paid for his temerity with his life in one moment more, had not three of his people sprung on Lander, and forced the gun from his hands. His jacket and shoes were now plundered from him, and observing some other fellows at the ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... once collected his warriors to drive the bold robber from the conquered castle. The temerity of the count and his superior forces dismayed Adalbert, giving him grounds for sober reflections. But the good bishop was a clever man and, not believing himself sufficiently strong to resist the count, he sought refuge in ...
— Legends of the Rhine • Wilhelm Ruland
... 1820. In 1842 Joule, of Manchester, England, proved the quantitative relation between mechanical energy and heat. In 1863 note the dates Tyndall gave a course of lectures on heat as a mode of motion, and was even then sneered at by some scientific men for his temerity. Tait, of Glasgow, was particularly obstreperous. To-day nobody questions it; and we go back to Sir Humphry Davy and Count Rumford for our proofs, too. It was proved scientifically proved then; but it took the world ...
— Our Unitarian Gospel • Minot Savage
... citizen in this great land is not a trifling but a gigantic ambition, worthy of all honest striving but involving, in the ordinary sense, no supreme issue. So if personal reasons only animated us, we could not muster the temerity to state our case with the ardent zeal ...
— The Progressive Democracy of James M. Cox • Charles E. Morris
... Marshall himself, has remained the doctrine of the Court. Secondly, there was good ground for Jefferson's criticism, which did not touch the constitutional features of the decision, but did inveigh against the temerity of the Court in passing on the merits of a case of which, by its own admission, it had ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... one-eyed Kalandar. Persons who met Burton and his friends enquired Irish-like if they were the party who had been put to death by the Amir of Harar. Everyone, indeed, was amazed to see them not only alive, but uninjured, and the Frank's temerity became the talk of the desert. Burton now put the two women, the Kalandar, the camels, and the baggage, under the care of a guide, and sent them to Zeila, while he himself and the men made straight for Berbera. The journey, which led them past Moga's tooth [159] and Gogaysa, was a terrible ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... that I would not," I returned. Then in answer to the appeal of her whole attitude and expression: "No, there were no footprints left; but I came upon something else which I have sufficient temerity to believe will answer the same purpose. Remember that my object is first to convince you and afterward Mrs. Carew, that it will be useless for her to deny that she has been in that room. Once that is understood, the rest will come easy; for we know the ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... feet and moved steadily forward to receive the onset of the French. Wolfe had been hit on the wrist, but hastily binding up the shattered limb with his handkerchief, he now placed himself at the head of the Louisburg Grenadiers, whose temerity against the heights of Beauport, in July, he had soundly rated. He had issued strict orders that his troops were to load with two bullets, and to reserve their fire till the enemy were at close quarters. He was nobly obeyed, though the French columns came on firing wildly and rapidly ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... temerity to declare that all have a right to bread, that there is bread enough for all, and that with this watchword of Bread for All the Revolution ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin
... might explain many a coldness could we look into the heart concealed from us; we should often pity where we hate, love when we curl the lip with scorn and indignation. To judge without reserve of any human action is a culpable temerity, of all our sins the ...
— The Jericho Road • W. Bion Adkins
... world to be employ'd as a discoverer; if, on the other hand, he boldly encounters all the dangers and Obstacles he meets with, and is unfortunate enough not to succeed, he is then Charged with Temerity, and, perhaps, want of Conduct. The former of these Aspersions, I am confident, can never be laid to my Charge, and if I am fortunate to Surmount all the Dangers we meet with, the latter will never be brought in Question; altho' I must own that ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook
... it," said the gentleman; and going over to Don Quixote, who was insisting upon the keeper's opening the cages, he said to him, "Sir Knight, knights-errant should attempt adventures which encourage the hope of a successful issue, not those which entirely withhold it; for valor that trenches upon temerity savors rather of madness than of courage; moreover, these lions do not come to oppose you, nor do they dream of such a thing; they are going as presents to his Majesty, and it will not be right to stop them or delay ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... his allegiance, had been so great, in restoring the prince to his liberty, and assisting him in his victories against the rebellious barons, that it was almost impossible to content him in his demands; and his youth and temerity as well as his great power, tempted him, on some new disgust, to raise again the flames of rebellion in the kingdom. The mutinous populace of London at his instigation took to arms; and the prince was obliged to levy an ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... market most wildly and desperately sought today is the market where labor is cheapest and most helpless and profit is most abundant. This labor is kept cheap and helpless because the white world despises "darkies." If one has the temerity to suggest that these workingmen may walk the way of white workingmen and climb by votes and self-assertion and education to the rank of men, he is howled out of court. They cannot do it and if they could, they shall not, for they are the enemies of the white race and the whites ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... was in San Francisco. But although successful and the bearer of the treasure, it is doubtful if he approached this end of his journey with the temerity he had shown on entering the robbers' valley. A consciousness that the methods he had employed might excite the ridicule, if not the censure, of his principals, or that he might have compromised them in his meeting with Snapshot Harry, considerably ...
— From Sand Hill to Pine • Bret Harte
... Base, artful wretch that you are! learn to be more respectful! Are my passions to be wound and unwound by an insolent domestic? Do you think I will be an instrument to be played on at your pleasure, till you have extorted all the treasures of my soul? Begone, and fear lest you be made to pay for the temerity you ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... the Sawtooth had on its pay roll men who were paid to kill and to leave no trace. So many heedless ones crossed the Sawtooth's path to riches! Fred Thurman had been one; a "bull-headed cuss" who had the temerity to fight back when the Sawtooth calmly laid claim to the first water rights to Granite Creek, having bought it, they said, with the placer claim of an old miner who had prospected along the headwaters of Granite at the ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... correspondence that followed that call, the great preacher was on the defensive from the first, and in reading over two or three letters that, because of blots or errors, had to be recopied, I am fairly amazed at the temerity of some of my remarks. In one place I charge him with "standing upon his closed Bible to lift himself above sinners, instead of going to them with the open volume and teaching them ...
— Stage Confidences • Clara Morris
... public schools not only leaves undone remedial work necessary for the health of public school children but neglects entirely the still large numbers who go to parochial, private pay, and private free schools; no one has had the temerity to suggest that the public shall force upon nonpublic schools a system of free operations, free ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... feeling, a little reflection upon his now altered character might have forewarned them that such interference would prove as little useful to him as safe for themselves; and it is not without some surprise I look back upon my own temerity and presumption in supposing that, let loose as he was now, in the full pride and consciousness of strength, with the wide regions of thought outstretching before him, any representations that even friendship could make would have the power—or ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron
... were determined to so perform their task that no charge of having left anything undone could possibly lie. Commander Briggs, the first of the aviators to reach the scene, flew as low as one hundred feet above the roofs, dropping his bombs with deadly accuracy. But he paid for his temerity with the loss of his machine and his liberty. A bullet pierced his petrol tank and there was nothing for him to do save to glide to earth and surrender. The two aviators who accompanied him although their machines were repeatedly hit were ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... plunging in among a parcel of these river-nymphs, and counting vainly on my superior strength, sought to drag some of them under the water, but I quickly repented my temerity. The amphibious young creatures swarmed about me like a shoal of dolphins, and seizing hold of my devoted limbs, tumbled me about and ducked me under the surface, until from the strange noises which rang in my ears, and the ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... than five hundred of these Highland reivers, who have been ever lapis offensionis et petra scandali, a stumbling-block and a rock of offence, to the Lowland vicinage—he discomfited them, I say, when they had the temerity to descend to harry this country, in the time of the civil dissensions, in the year of grace sixteen hundred forty and two. And now, sir, I, his grandson, am thus used at such ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... course, will accompany me to the Faujdar. He will be incensed, I make no doubt, at your temerity, and not unjustly; but I will intercede for you, and you will be treated with ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... the bag drop into the water. After being in the water several minutes, I swam to the landing with the coals on my back, amid the deafening shouts of scores of spectators. I look back on this act of temerity with feelings ...
— The Hero of the Humber - or the History of the Late Mr. John Ellerthorpe • Henry Woodcock
... all possibility of succor than had ever been done before, and that they ought not to proceed on the voyage to their manifest destruction. If they did they would soon have reason to repent their temerity, as provisions would soon fall short, the ships were already faulty and would soon fail, and it would be extremely difficult to get back so far as they had already gone. None could condemn them in their own opinion for now turning back, but all must consider them as ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... United States Senate had been ever reserved for gentlemen, and Patrick Henry Hanway was a clod. The fiat went forth; Patrick Henry Hanway should not go to the Senate; a wide-eyed patrician wonder was abroad that he should have had the insolent temerity to harbor such a dream—he who was of the social reptilia and could not show an ancestor who had owned ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... the vessel has been able to discover any there, he shall be condemned in all the charges and damages, which he shall have caused, both to the owners of the vessels, and to the owners and freighters of the cargoes with which they shall be loaded, for his temerity in taking and carrying them into port; it being declared most expressly, that free vessels shall assure the liberty of the effects with which they shall be ladened, and that this liberty shall extend itself equally ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... narrative is as follows: "When the boar saw the tiger the latter roared. But the old boar did not seem to mind the roar so very much as might have been anticipated. He actually repeated his 'hoo! hoo!' only in a, if possible, more aggressive, insulting, and defiant manner. Nay, more, such was his temerity that he actually advanced with a short, sharp rush in the direction of the striped intruder. Intently peering through the indistinct light, we eagerly watched the development of this strange rencontre. The tiger was now crouching ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... his earnestness and quite without thought grasped her hand. The contact checked the flow of his speech and suddenly made him aghast at his temerity. But the girl did not make any effort to withdraw it. So Jean, inhaling a deep breath and trying to see through his bewilderment, held on bravely. He imagined he felt a faint, warm, returning pressure. She was young, she was friendless, she was human. By this hand in his Jean felt more than ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... solar volcanoes, of which the burning mountains of the earth convey but a feeble idea. Hence observations become necessary as to the nature of the incandescent matter of the sun; and when we remember the immense distance of that body, such an attempt may well appear to be one of temerity. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 441 - Volume 17, New Series, June 12, 1852 • Various
... whether she had to deal with kings or heretics, the peculiar nature of her power forced her to work through instruments which she was powerless to keep in hand, and in which she had placed her confidence with the temerity of desperation. There can be no greater contrast than that between the Hildebrandine programme and the measures by which it was incompletely realised. To enforce the celibacy of the clergy the mobs of Milan and the South-German cities ...
— Medieval Europe • H. W. C. Davis
... toyed with voluptuousness. I know nothing more accurate; and the penetration of this poet seems, for the moment, something more than human. After a single example, such as adduced, would not he be guilty of temerity who would question Shakespeare's accuracy in character delineation? The sum of what has been said on this point is, distrust yourself rather than Shakespeare; and when your notions and his are not coincident, or when, more strongly ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle
... own temerity. This is reversing the order of things; the pupil correcting his master. But, candidly speaking, I do think these two poems the most defective of any I ever saw of yours, which, usually, have been remarkably free from all angles on ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... around it all the tribes of Coele-Syria, whose assistance Hadadezer, but a short while before, had claimed in his war with the foreigner. Neither Arpad, Hadrach, nor Damascus ever neglected to send the customary presents to any sovereign who had the temerity to cross the Euphrates and advance into their neighbourhood, but the necessity for this act of homage became more and more infrequent. During his reign of eighteen years Assurdan III., son and successor of Shalmaneser ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... provide the means for supporting or moving them; a feather would have turned the balance last year, notwithstanding the powerful aid we received from abroad. Providence blinded our adversaries; to their temerity we owe our success. ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various
... by the enemy, who usually had from twice to twenty times their number of cannon, yet the burghers were well aware of the fact and did not allow it to interfere with their plans nor did they display great temerity in battling with such a foe. When Lord Roberts and his three thousand cavalry entered Jacobsdal there were less than one hundred armed Boers in the town, but they made a determined stand against the enemy, and in a street-fight a large percentage ...
— With the Boer Forces • Howard C. Hillegas |
