"Tempting" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... seemed to be all right again, and full of comical antics. And after that Toby spent about all his time hovering around the place where Link was chained, talking to him, coaxing him to show off by tempting pieces of food, and enjoying himself more than ...
— Chums of the Camp Fire • Lawrence J. Leslie
... I have naturally a large Faith, Child, and thou'st a promising Form, a tempting Motion, clean Limbs, well drest, and ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... Vamachari or left-handed sects. He told them that they had taken up an ass's load of religion, and had better apply to honest industry. He fell foul of the gods; accused Yama of kicking his own mother, Indra of tempting the wife of his spiritual guide, and Shiva of associating with low women. Thus, he said, no one can respect them. Do not we say when it thunders awfully, "the rascally gods are dying!" And when it is too wet, "these villain gods are sending too much rain"? Briefly, the young Brahman replied ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... nearly cooked; its skin began to frizzle and crack; what was visible of the flesh through the gravy was red and tempting. Finally, a dozen large yams, of yellow and savory pulp, were cooking in the ashes, ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... they might derive from alliance with the enemies of Athens, and looked anxiously to see a Peloponnesian fleet appear off the coast of Asia. Tissaphernes and Pharnabazus vied with each other in the tempting offers which they made to Sparta, and it was not long before a formal treaty was concluded between that state and Persia, by which the two powers bound themselves to carry on ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson
... second. It was she had the notion of educating you, I only followed her lead. Your work will be lighter than mine, but you must do it. I am a poor man, as you know; but, were I rich, I would not give you the means to lead an idle life, because that would be tempting you to vices and shaming you. Ah! if I thought your education had given you a taste for idleness, I should be sorry not to have made you a working man like myself. But then, I know you have a good heart; you have not got into your stride ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... confidence in successes for the future and a conviction that come what may we are destined to muddle through. A special providence is watching over us—a cousin German to the Kaiser's "good old God." In truth we are tempting Fate, postulating an exception to the law of cause and effect, and looking for Hebrew miracles in ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon
... cheap." But he became silent and devoted himself to the breakfast, which Mrs. Rushton, with Martha's help, had made unusually tempting in order to coax him into ...
— The Rushton Boys at Rally Hall - Or, Great Days in School and Out • Spencer Davenport
... evidence of your eyes) sat serene in round-shouldered bottles—conventional, secure in its reputation. Cognac and Garnkirk, a case for each, rode in tall, slim bottles with no shoulders at all. Plumper than they, Three Star Hennessey sat smugly waiting until the joke was turned upon its victim. A tempting load it was, to men of certain minds and morals. Casey grinned sardonically when he ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... and graven images, I might confide that Allah would strengthen my arm; or if I fell beneath the sword of the Melech Ric, I could not pass to Paradise by a more glorious death. But Allah has already given Jerusalem to the true believers, and it were a tempting the God of the Prophet to peril, upon my own personal strength and skill, that which I hold securely by the ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... tempting to be refused, and Mac scrambled to his feet. As he did so, the blanket slipped to one side. Swiftly Mac huddled it around him again; but the momentary glimpse had sufficed to show the stranger a dark blue gown and ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... what he wanted, as it were, in his open hand, would be the financier he would favor in preference to a much less grasping accommodator, who might keep him waiting for a week. It was not so much the tempting bait of ready money that caught the Squire as the fact of his wishes being obeyed upon the instant. He had not been used to wait, and his pride revolted against it; and many a time had a usurer missed his mark by not understanding with how great a bashaw he had to deal in the person ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... our oral genealogist, Furayj: "Now, when the wife of the Shaykh of the Musalimah had heard and understood what Satan was tempting her husband to do against her tribe, she rose up, and sent a secret message to her brother of the Beni 'Amr, warning him that a certain person (Fulan) was about to lay violent hands on the beautiful valley of El-Madyan. Hearing this, ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... to persuade Don Quixote not to do such a mad thing, as it was tempting God to engage in such a piece of folly. To this, Don Quixote replied that he knew what he was about. The gentleman in return entreated him to reflect, for he knew he was ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... know, my Lady, but, as I said, I looked in the door, although forbid to do so. Half-open doors are so tempting, and one cannot shut one's eyes! Even a keyhole is hard to resist when you long to know what is on the other side of ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... sin of uncleanness, by the spangling shew of fine cloaths, than he could possibly have drawn unto it, without them. I wonder what it was, that of old was called the Attire of an Harlot: certainly it could not be more bewitching and tempting than are the garments of many ...
— The Life and Death of Mr. Badman • John Bunyan
... wanton wing, May dip and dive in Pleasure's spring; But, if it wait for winter's breeze, The spring will chill, the heart will freeze. And then, that Hope, that fairy Hope,— Oh! she awaked such happy dreams, And gave my soul such tempting scope For all its dearest, fondest schemes, That not Verona's child of song, When flying from the Phrygian shore, With lighter heart could bound along, Or pant to ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... tempting reflections on the queer anomaly that this prohibition should be addressed (as it so often is) by writers to writers, by newspaper writers to men who write books, and (so far as a distinction can be drawn) by men who write in a hurry ...
— From a Cornish Window - A New Edition • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... health is an individual matter, and what agrees well with me would cause others to sicken. I eat the simplest food always, and naturally, being an Italian, I prefer the food of my native land. But simple French or German cookery agrees with me quite as well. And I allow the tempting pastry, the rich and overspiced pate, to pass me by untouched and console myself with quantities of fruit and ...
— Caruso and Tetrazzini on the Art of Singing • Enrico Caruso and Luisa Tetrazzini
... some tracts, and a few odd volumes picked up cheap at fairs; an old musket (occasionally Ben's companion, sometimes Tom's) is hooked to the rafters near a double rope of onions; divers gaudy little prints, tempting spoil of pedlars, in honour of George Barnwell, the Prodigal Son, the Sailor's Return, and the Death of Nelson, decorate the walls, and an illuminated Christmas carol is pasted over the mantel-piece: which, among other chattels and possessions, conspicuously bears its own burden of Albert and Victoria—two ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... lives had myself and my companion received an invitation so out of the way, so bewilderingly tempting! And we felt too, with a pang, that never again in all probability should we receive such another. But on this especial day we were not staying at Moret, only running over for the afternoon from our headquarters at Bourron. Acceptance was thus hemmed round with small impediments. And by way ...
— East of Paris - Sketches in the Gatinais, Bourbonnais, and Champagne • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... to his task, Henry and Paul took their fish hooks and lines and went down to the creek that flowed near. It was so easy to catch perch and other fish that there was no sport in it, and as soon as they had enough for supper and breakfast they went back to the fire where the tempting odors that arose indicated the truth of the schoolmaster's assertion. The squirrels were done to a turn, and no doubt of his ...
— The Young Trailers - A Story of Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... would have it no other way. The piece de resistance was ham and eggs, great fragrant crispy slices of ham browned faintly gold across their pinky surface, and eggs—Hitty knew where to get country eggs, too—so white, so golden-yolked, so tempting that it was difficult to associate them with the prosaic process of frying, but fried they were. With them were served boiled potatoes in their jackets,—no wash-day cook ever removed the peeling from an emergency potato,—and afterward a course of ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... written in Indian ink: I had it for fourteen years, but a rascally valet, seeing it very dirty, WASHED it, forsooth, and washed off every bit of the writing). I took it calmly, and said, "This is a tempting offer. O Vizier, how long wilt thou give me to consider ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... with affection; none the less his spirit went about the island clothed with terrors, and the neighbourhood of Government House was still avoided after dark. We may sum up the cheerful doctrine thus: All men become vampires, and the vampire spares none. And here we come face to face with a tempting inconsistency. For the whistling spirits are notoriously clannish; I understood them to wait upon and to enlighten kinsfolk only, and that the medium was always of the race of the communicating spirit. Here, then, we have the bonds ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... systems, or who have made a system for themselves out of parts selected from both. They seem to hold some of the Romish rites and doctrines in high respect. They treat the vow of celibacy, for example, so tempting, and, in later times, so common a subject for ribaldry, with mysterious reverence. Almost every member of a religious order whom they introduce is a holy and venerable man. We remember in their plays nothing resembling the coarse ridicule with ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... other family of which the fossil botanist has not yet succeeded in finding any trace in even the Tertiary deposits, and which appears to have been specially created for the gratification of human sense. Unlike the Rosaceae, it exhibits no rich blow of color, or tempting show of luscious fruit;—- it does not appeal very directly to either the sense of taste or of sight: but it is richly odoriferous; and, though deemed somewhat out of place in the garden for the last century and more, it enters largely ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... munched stolidly away at his oats. She put the tempting wisp against his nose, at which he laid back his ears and looked vicious. She turned to Mr. Yocomb, and the old barn echoed to a laugh that was music ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe
... Austrians crush their main force at Neerwinden. Thereupon Coburg claims the Duke's assistance in driving the Republicans from the fortresses of French Flanders. Pitt and his colleagues give their assent, because the enterprise seems easy after the defection of Dumouriez, and Dunkirk is a tempting prize near to hand, but mainly owing to their urgent desire that Austria shall find her indemnity not in Bavaria, but in the French border fortresses. Thus, for reasons which are political, rather than military, the Cabinet ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... of the stir his previous doings had kicked up, and of the winged words the colonel had used to the head-keeper; of the traps set all about, of the gins doubled and trebled in the wood and round the park, and of the under-keepers who, with guns and tempting baits, took up their positions to wait for him as ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... he drew the bow, And soft grew the music sweet and low, The lids fell wearily over the eyes, The bow arm stopped and the melodies. The last strain melted along the deep, And Ned, the old fisherman, sank to sleep. Just then a huge drum, sent hither by fate, Caught a passing glimpse of the tempting bait. . . . . . . . One terrible jerk of wrath and dread From the wounded fish as away he sped With a strength by rage made double— And into the water went old Ned. No time for any 'last words' to be said, For the waves settled placidly over his ...
— Mistress Anne • Temple Bailey
... I only knew as a weaver and a poacher; a lank, long-armed man, much bent from crouching in ditches whence he watched his snares. To the young he was a romantic figure, because they saw him frequently in the fields with his call-birds tempting siskins, yellow yites, and linties to twigs which he had previously smeared with lime. He made the lime from the tough roots of holly; sometimes from linseed oil, which is boiled until thick, when it is taken out of the pot and drawn and stretched ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... When the Margarita patache failed to meet the galleons at Cartagena, it was given its clearance and allowed to sail alone to Havana—a tempting prey to ...
— The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century • Clarence Henry Haring
... wear your watch-chain so prominently," I remarked, "especially during the present vogue of crime—so tempting, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, February 25th, 1920 • Various
... not in prejudice against the blacks—not in sectional estrangement—not in the hope of political dominion—but in a deep and abiding necessity. Here is this vast ignorant and purchasable vote—clannish, credulous, impulsive and passionate—tempting every art of the demagogue, but insensible to the appeal of the statesman. Wrongly started, in that it was led into alienation from its neighbor and taught to rely on the protection of an outside force, it cannot be merged and lost in the two great parties through ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... vigilant defence before Soochow necessary to guard the extensive line of stockades, and to prevent its large garrison sallying out and assailing his own rear. Gordon had consequently for these considerations to abandon the tempting idea of crushing Chung Wang and capturing the towns in the rear of Nanking, and to have recourse to ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... "we might have known that would happen. The idea of sending three car-loads of raw recruits with only one officer, and that one old Muffet. It's tempting Providence." ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... till three years later that, in the course of a few weeks' idling on the Riviera, it suddenly occurred to me to wonder why Gisburn had given up his painting. On reflection, it really was a tempting problem. To accuse his wife would have been too easy—his fair sitters had been denied the solace of saying that Mrs. Gisburn had "dragged him down." For Mrs. Gisburn—as such—had not existed till nearly a year after Jack's resolve ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... under the trees afterwards, having yielded our places in the primitive dining-room to the Indian guests, the President suggested a sunset row on the lake. The hour and the light were most tempting; and we were soon off in the canoe, taking no boatmen, the gentlemen preferring to row themselves. We went through the same lovely region, half water, half land, over which we had passed in the morning, floating between patches of greenest grass, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... sensual pleasure, and that dreadful price men pay for it—shameful death. I hope it may be of use in correcting the errors of juvenile tempers devoted to their passions, with whom sometimes danger passes for a certain road to honour, and the highway seems as tempting to them as chivalry did to Don Quixote. Such and some other such like, are very unlucky notions in young heads, and too often inspire them with courage enough to dare the gallows, which seldom fails meeting with them in ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... meant Agatha, and Agatha had grown to be the one absorbing passion of his heart. Agatha had been at the back of the superhuman fight which he had waged all night against death. Agatha was behind Carr's words. The thought of her was tempting him ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman
... just dull and level and monotonous and dusty, as are so many excellent highways. But now she stood at two crossroads, and saw stretching before her one in no wise different from that she had traversed so long, and the other a glittering tempting path springing joyously up a high hill, on the top of which, in the shade of laurel trees, sat at ease the whole goodly company of great authors. She fancied they were beckoning to her; she heard sweet voices from them throughout that feverish ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... daily to inquire after her welfare. Senor Cuzco Gonzales, as you might be unlucky enough to leave your bones on this prairie, I would advise you to make me heir to your garden of chile peppers. To be sure, I never saw a more tempting crop! Mayhap you will have no further use for chile, as the Indians are likely to heat your belly with hot coals, in lieu ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... these pretty Tarascon hillocks are very tempting, perfumed with myrtle, lavender, and rosemary; and these fine muscat grapes, swollen with sweetness, which grow by the side of the Rhone, extremely appetising too—yes, but there is Tarascon behind, and in the little world of fur and feather Tarascon has an evil fame. The birds of passage themselves ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... Motion." But the most strange of all, perhaps, was "For an Undertaking which shall in due time be revealed." Each subscriber was to pay down two gnineas, and hereafter to receive a share of one hundred, with a disclosure of the object; and so tempting was the offer, that 1,000 of these subscriptions were paid the same morning, with which the projector went off in the afternoon.' In 1825 there were speculations in companies nearly as wild, and just before 1866 there were some of a like nature, though not equally extravagant. ...
— Lombard Street: A Description of the Money Market • Walter Bagehot
... but father wants it worse.—No, I won't change my half-crown," said the boy, turning away from the tempting oranges. ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth
... day the laborers should ascend and be refreshed by whatever he had to offer them, beside catching the inspiration of the lovely and extensive landscape. Some days he had not much to offer them; at other times, the repast would be sumptuous and most tempting: so those who went each day were sure of receiving in their season the delicious fruits which ...
— Allegories of Life • Mrs. J. S. Adams
... assailants was horrible and repugnant to her, and she found it no less horrible and repugnant to look at their perspiring faces, at the gleaming of their enkindled eyes. But their beauty was tempting. In the dark depths of her consciousness a thought struggled—to yield herself, ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub
... worlds have his father think that he was discontented, or otherwise than pleased with the present he had received that morning. He was heartily ashamed of himself in that he had listened with a certain degree of complacency to his cousin's tempting; but he had no idea that the subject would be repeated—and then repeated, too, before his father, in a manner to vex him on such a day as this, before such people as were assembled there. He was very angry with his cousin, and for a moment forgot all his hereditary ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope
... shadow upon the sunshine of their wedded life. Arthur and his father were prospered in their business, and for many years they all lived happily together. In process of time his parents died, and Arthur soon after sold out his share in the business to a younger brother, as he had received a tempting offer to remove to Boston, and enter into partnership with Mr. Worthing's son, as the old gentleman had some time before resigned any active share in the business. When Arthur learned their wishes he was very anxious to return to them; "For," said he, ...
— Stories and Sketches • Harriet S. Caswell
... in another room, his mind still teeming with schemes of future deceit to cover his former villainies. As he reflected on his position, he came to a determination to see Hatteraick, if possible, and to induce him by a tempting bribe to give evidence in his favour when his ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... had only France to win to her side, and in this policy she had the services of an invaluable agent, Count Kaunitz, the greatest diplomat of the age. Kaunitz held out to France, as the price for the abandonment of the Prussian alliance and the acceptance of that of Austria, the tempting bait of Frederick's Rhenish provinces. But Louis XV at first refused an Austrian alliance: it would be a departure from the traditional French policy of opposing the Habsburgs. Kaunitz then appealed to the king's mistress, the ambitious Madame de Pompadour, ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... to their meal; the two Indians were removed to a distance under the guard of one of the soldiers, but Percival remained with them. John sat by Percival, and cutting off a tempting bit of venison, held it to his mouth, saying to him, "Percival, when we go home again, your hands shall be untied, and you shall have a rifle of your own instead of a bow and arrows; ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... short time all was ready. Cook had packed a most tempting lunch of ham sandwiches, plum-cake, and gooseberry turnovers, and this was placed in a basket on Algy's mail-cart; and then off he started, and Charlie and Basil, with little Ivy between them, ran after him down the long avenue, laughing and singing ...
— Golden Moments - Bright Stories for Young Folks • Anonymous
... essay as a painter—and, without variation of a cobweb, and, with whimsical care and effort on the part of Miss Fanny, this apartment was reproduced at Revedere—her own picture on the easel, as it stood on the night of his abandonment of his art, and palette, pencils and colors in tempting readiness on the table. Even the fire-grate of the old studio had been re-set in the new, and the cottage throughout had been refitted with a view to occupation in the winter. And to sundry hints on the part of the elder brother, that some thought ...
— Stories by American Authors (Volume 4) • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... sad mirage; true and untrue She seems, and, pressing ever on in vain, I yearn across the mocking, tempting blue. Never she draws more near, never I gain A furlong's space toward where she sits and a miles; Smiles and cares nothing for my ...
— Verses • Susan Coolidge
... stream?—Were not the food and liquor belonging to the white men of the law far superiour to these insipid fish, these dried roots, and these running waters?—Were not a physician's cap, an elegant morning gown, and a grave suit of black clothes, made by an european tailor, more tempting to your imagination, than this wretched blanket, that is eternally slipping from your shoulders, unless it be fastened with skewers, which ...
— Travels in the United States of America • William Priest
... it is Ynoch that brings the Sabah here to-day. We thank you, my boy, for tempting him ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... flies, and that he loves them?" (Just imagine an infinite God in love with a blue-bottle fly!) Well, the little girl thought that was queer taste, but she was sorry, and said that she would not do it any more. By and by, however, a great lazy fly was too tempting, and her plump little finger began to follow him around slowly on the glass, and she said, "Oh you nice big fly, did dod made you? And does dod love you? And does you love dod?" (Down came the finger.) "Well, you ...
— Men, Women, and Gods - And Other Lectures • Helen H. Gardener
... On elephants, or steeds bestrode, Ten thousand voices shouting, "This Is heaven indeed for perfect bliss." With garlands decked they idly strayed, And danced and laughed and sang and played. At length as every soldier eyed, With food like Amrit satisfied, Each dainty cate and tempting meat, No longer had he care to eat. Thus soldier, servant, dame, and slave Received whate'er the wish might crave. As each in new-wrought clothes arrayed Enjoyed the feast before him laid. Each man was seen in white attire Unstained by spot or speck of ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... of musicians. Here Viotti's friend, Garat, whose voice had so great a range as to cover both the tenor and barytone registers, was wont to sing; and here young Orfila, the brilliant chemist, displayed his magnificent tenor voice in such a manner as to attract the most tempting offers from managers that he should desert the laboratory for the stage. But the young Portuguese was fascinated with science, and was already far advanced in the career which made him in his day the greatest ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris
... fine old Elizabethan house—a house of historical interest. I must have woods and lakes—and a deer-park, above all. Deer are very gentlemanlike things, very. De Clifford's place is to be sold, I know; they ask too much for it, but ready money is tempting. I can bargain—bargain, I am a good hand at a bargain. Should I be now Lord Baron Vargrave, if I had always given people what they asked? I will double my subscriptions to the Bible Society and ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... meal,—tea, sweetened with sugar, and vegetables and meat happily mingled in a stew. It was true that the vegetable end was held up by white grains of rice alone, but the meat was the white, tender flesh of grouse, permeating the entire dish with its tempting flavor. As a whole, the stew was greatly ...
— The Sky Line of Spruce • Edison Marshall
... complete control over his senses, he led the life of a brahmacari. In consequence of his excessive ascetic austerities Shakra was afflicted with a great fear. The sage could not be turned (away from his penance) by the offer of even diverse kinds of rewards. At last the chastiser of Paka, for tempting the sage, despatched unto him the exceedingly beautiful and celestial apsara, by name Alambusa. Thither where on the banks of the Sarasvati the high-souled sage was engaged in the act of gratifying the gods, the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... scuffling protests from the gendarme without) limped a black, untidy dog. The tramp bowed and began at once to speak in the slow correct French of a well-educated foreigner. He told of a dusty road along which he had toiled; of a coppice and its tempting shade; of the drowsiness of afternoon; of dream voices that were not, after all, of dream; of a mound with a mysterious grating; of a subterranean cavern and its two unusual and impatient prisoners. M. Lesueur listened in silence. The story done, he took up the telephone once ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... claim for suffrage may securely rest. To go farther in our assertions seems to me unsafe, although many of our wisest and most eloquent may differ from me; and the nearer we approach success, the more important it is to look to our weapons. It is a plausible and tempting argument, to claim suffrage for woman on the ground that she is an angel; but I think it will prove wiser, in the end, to claim it for ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... staring out into the darkness. He was not prone to superstition, but it seemed like tempting providence to remain there with the windows open any longer. Yet paradoxically, he lacked the moral courage to close them—to admit to himself ...
— The Golden Scorpion • Sax Rohmer
... little box on the top shelf of the closet in the front room, under a pile of blankets and comfortables. The key that unlocks it is hung on a nail driven into the back of the old bureau in the attic. I believe Hepsey is honest and reliable, but I don't believe in tempting folks. ...
— Lavender and Old Lace • Myrtle Reed
... good one may in by living with uncongenial, tempting persons. First such people do good by the very self-denial and self-control their mere presence demands. Then, their making one's home less home-like and perfect than it would be in their absence, may help to render our real home in ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... things for her, hushing the others with a strange look in her eyes that made them quiet at once, for they could see she was troubled. Or he seemed to smell the grateful smell of the hot cakes waiting, crisp and tempting, before the big cheerful fire, to greet them on their return from afternoon school on a dreary winter day. She had been kind, though she was so strict, especially to Elsie, and Duncan was feeling something very much like sorrow to think that, after ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... is a tempting one to linger over, did not imperative Exigencies of space compel me to pass on from it. There is much—very much—more critical matter in the Literary Remains of which it is hard to forbear quotation; and I may mention in particular the profoundly suggestive remarks on the ...
— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill
... It was so tempting to the weary young soul, who had already begun to sink under the accumulated burdens of the past year, not for herself, but for the sick mother, who complained unceasingly of the changed conditions of their lives. The care and attention would mean so ...
— 'Way Down East - A Romance of New England Life • Joseph R. Grismer
... thy Soul indulge the gen'rous Heat, Till captive Science yields her last Retreat; Should Reason guide thee with her brightest Ray, And pour on misty Doubt resistless Day; Should no false Kindness lure to loose Delight, Nor Praise relax, nor Difficulty fright; Should tempting Novelty thy Cell refrain, And Sloth's bland Opiates shed their Fumes in vain; Should Beauty blunt on Fops her fatal Dart, Nor claim the Triumph of a letter'd Heart; Should no Disease thy torpid Veins invade, Nor Melancholy's Phantoms haunt thy Shade; Yet ...
— The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749) and Two Rambler papers (1750) • Samuel Johnson
... We got along very nicely. An old chap who sat above us some seats, and whose rotund developments gave any ordinary observer reason to suppose his appetite as unquenchable as the Maelstrom, kept reaching about, and when tempting vessels were too remote, he'd ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... evolution were certainly of tempting excellence. In point of beauty and apparent natural capacity, Gnulemah might claim equality with the noblest daughter of the Pharaohs. The grand primary problem of how to isolate her from all contact with the outside world was, under the existing circumstances, ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... at the breakfast-table and had addressed themselves to the various good things that black Deborah had provided. The native Johnny cakes, made of meal ground by their own windmill, the Marquis professed to find particularly tempting. ...
— The Inn at the Red Oak • Latta Griswold
... those who, when they had seen many signs and wonders done by Christ, which did bear testimony to all the world of his divine nature, yet they would not be satisfied, but sought out another sign, tempting him, Matt. xvi. 1. And truly, he might return this answer to us, "O wicked and adulterous generation, that seeketh after a sign, there shall no sign be given to thee, but the sign of the prophet Jonas." The greatest testimony that can be imagined, is given ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... that I must go to the Blue Boar, my mind was much disturbed by indecision whether or not to take the Avenger. It was tempting to think of that expensive Mercenary publicly airing his boots in the archway of the Blue Boar's posting-yard; it was almost solemn to imagine him casually produced in the tailor's shop, and confounding the disrespectful senses of Trabb's boy. On the other hand, Trabb's boy ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... into Mr. Jones' hands, and he immediately resolved to use them for the purposes of the window. Some half-dozen of them were very tastefully arranged upon racks, and were marked at prices which were very tempting to ladies of discernment. In the middle of one window there was a copious mantle, of silk so thick that it stood almost alone, very full in its dimensions, and admirable in its fashion. This mantle, which ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... civilization is determined by natural advantages, it must be that Cydonia was the "mother of cities," at least of all the Hellenic realm, for no more enchanting or tempting site have I ever known through travel or description. With its climate of paradisiacal softness and healthfulness, and the beauty of its framing hills,—fanned in summer by the north winds from the AEgean and by south winds tempered by the snows of the Aspravouna,—with a winter in which vegetation ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... that there was, at no great distance away, a spot where, at the risk only of breaking one's neck, it was possible to scale the city wall; wherefore, having consulted a child as to the exact locality, besides tempting him with a string of cash, I proceeded to find it, and soon, under his guidance, reached it. The wall at this spot was, I may mention, about twenty feet high. Having, then, fastened my paint-box and sketches ...
— Corea or Cho-sen • A (Arnold) Henry Savage-Landor
... summit. Or he may explore this whole region at his leisure. He may climb the hard mountain trails that radiate from Longmires and Paradise. He may work up over the lower glaciers, studying their crevasses, ice caves and flow. He will want to ascend some of the tempting crags of the ragged Tatoosh, for the panorama of ice-capped peaks and dark, forested ranges which is there unfolded. After a week or two of such "trying-out," to develop wind and harden muscle, he may even scale the great Mountain ...
— The Mountain that was 'God' • John H. Williams
... really tempting. The absence of meat was compensated to us by the crisp and racy onions, and I craved only a little salt, which had been interdicted, as a most pernicious substance. I sat at one corner of the table, beside Perkins Brown, who took an opportunity, while the others were engaged in conversation, ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... self-opinionated, and more conscious of the inferiority of her fellow-creatures. These innate instincts had been ripened and developed by several London seasons, and were now accompanied by a flavour of sourness which was meant for wit. She had not been without offers, but there had been no offer tempting enough to induce her to abandon her privileges as Dr. Rylance's daughter. She had an idea that her marriage would be the signal for Dr. Rylance to take unto himself a second wife; and she was disinclined to give that signal. The more ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... our will has the chance of a choice, that moral life becomes possible. The sensibility to this external stimulus brings with it, when men have it to excess, an unusual access of moral difficulty. Everything acts on them, and everything has a chance of turning them aside; the most tempting things act upon them very deeply and their influence, in consequence, is extreme. Naturally, therefore, the errors of such men are great. We need not ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... Walter hunted about in search of game or fruits, which might serve as an addition to their breakfast. Birds of gorgeous plumage flew about overhead, or flitted among the branches of the trees; and high up, far beyond their reach, they observed some tempting-looking fruit, on which numerous birds were feeding. They gazed at them with ...
— The South Sea Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston
... big, appealing eyes, he might have found his way more easily into people's hearts. But he was a lean, snub-nosed little fellow, with a freckled face and neglected hair. No one would ever find his cheek a tempting one to kiss, and no one would be moved, by any feeling save pity, to stoop and put affectionate arms around Jonesy. He was only a common little street gamin, as unlovely as ...
— Two Little Knights of Kentucky • Annie Fellows Johnston
... respectful humility. Had he, poor fellow, known how busy those fingers would one day be against his religion—for he was a French Romanist—he might have been tempted to sheath his bayonet and give me free access to the tempting fire, the immense faggots of which would have sufficed to ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... promise to Mrs. Brewer. More than that, he charged himself with foolish disregard of a possibility which might have boundless significance for him. Here, it seemed, was sufficient motive for a return to London. The alternative was to wander on, and see more of foreign countries; a tempting suggestion, but marred by the prospect of loneliness. He would go back among his own people and make friends. Without comradeship, liberty had ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing
... mother and your wife for?" asked Brains. "Just foolishness, my friend. It's the devil tempting you, plague take him. Don't listen to the Evil One. Don't give way to him. When he talks to you about women you should answer him sharply: 'I don't want them!' When he talks of freedom, you should stick to it and ...
— The House with the Mezzanine and Other Stories • Anton Tchekoff
... restlessness that so often precedes a crisis or an illness he also had the air of a man at last determined to turn and face a pursuing enemy and stand, or fall by the clash. Fear was absent from face and manner. He even lightly jested as Jane, while greeting him, slipped into his pocket a tempting-looking package. ...
— The House of the Misty Star - A Romance of Youth and Hope and Love in Old Japan • Fannie Caldwell Macaulay
... opinions of the old physician by a show of opposition, being already predisposed to agree with many of them. He was rather trying the common arguments, as one tries tricks of fence merely to learn the way of parrying. But just here he saw a tempting opening, and could ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... breath of autumn these byways, difficult of achievement in any case, became more and more impassable. And, while flight toward the west might be successful, it was too charged with a suggestion of failure to be tempting. ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... behaves in exactly the same way with regard to its generator, and discharges itself upon him when opportunity offers. If it be an evil thought, he generally regards it as the suggestion of a tempting demon, whereas in truth he tempts himself. Usually each definite thought creates a new thought-form; but if a thought-form of the same nature is already hovering round the thinker, under certain circumstances a new thought on the same subject, instead of creating a new form, coalesces ...
— A Textbook of Theosophy • C.W. Leadbeater
... have been a tempting summons; but now the sickening sense of the sacrilegious murder, and of the life of outlawry utterly unrestrained, passed over Richard. Yet, if he should not accept the offer, what was before him? A ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... discouragement. One day I met a traveling man who told me that in a town in Indiana where there was a breakfast-food factory, hundreds of carloads of corn-cobs were shipped in annually and converted into these tempting foods. My relish for this article of ...
— Confessions of a Neurasthenic • William Taylor Marrs
... jointly or separately the John Murrays of the London Bohemians. Their house was the resort of novelists, poets, and especially dramatic writers, for twenty years before and twenty years after the close of the eighteenth century, and they were purveyors-general of circulating libraries, tempting the ambition of young authors with rosy promises of success and alluring baits of immortality, if they could only find the base metals in quantum stiff, to pay the cold-blooded paper-merchant and the vulgar type-setter. Many a poetic pigeon did the Stockdales ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... in proportion as we understand human beings, shall we understand the laws which they have obeyed, or which have avenged themselves on their disobedience. This may seem a truism: if it be such, it is one which we cannot too often repeat to ourselves just now, when the rapid progress of science is tempting us to look at human beings rather as things than as persons, and at abstractions (under the name of laws) rather as persons than as things. Discovering, to our just delight, order and law all around us, in a thousand events which seemed to our fathers fortuitous ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... parish; not contracted close 60 In streets, but here and there a straggling house; Yet still he was at hand, without request, To serve the sick; to succour the distress'd: Tempting, on foot, alone, without affright, The dangers ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... she's cracky. To gie her her due, she's cracky, and as for her being a cuttie, you've said yoursel, Mr. Dishart, that we're all desperately wicked, But we're sair tried. Has it ever struck you that the trouts bites best on the Sabbath? God's critturs tempting decent men." ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... sooner, a child born when the parents were thirty might rank as the tenth child, and would be so reckoned by the biometricians. One does not need to be a biologist to perceive that conclusions based upon assumptions so uncritical are worth nothing at all, and it is tempting to suggest that the biometricians are so called, on a principle long famous, because they measure ...
— Woman and Womanhood - A Search for Principles • C. W. Saleeby
... It is tempting to lament the extinction of arts letters, and elaborated habits of civility, which followed the barbarian invasions. Yet without such extinction, how can we imagine to ourselves the growth of those new arts, original literatures, ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... be no doubt that such a proposal must have startled and even disgusted the frank nature of the French King; but it was nevertheless too tempting to be rejected; and he himself avowed to Sully, when the new conspiracy of D'Auvergne became known to him, that it was less by the prayers of the culprit's sister, and by his own consideration for the children whom she had ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... feel deeply, but no longer a boy to yield to every tempting impulse. I have said that FORTITUDE was his favourite virtue, but fortitude is the virtue of great and rare occasions; there was another, equally hard-favoured and unshowy, which he took as the staple of active and every-day duties, and that virtue was JUSTICE. Now, in earlier ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... officials grew noticeably polite; the very houseporter touched his cap at your approach. Bakers' shops were piled high with WEIHNACHTSSTOLLEN, which were a special mark of the festival: cakes shaped like torpedoes, whose sugared, almonded coats brisked brown and tempting. But the spicy scent of the firs was the motive that recurred most persistently: it clung even to ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... homestead flowers and fruited trees May Eden's orchard shame; We taste the tempting sweets of these Like ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... the Southrons stood firm the Highlanders wavered. But they were too few for Mackay to have any hopes of retrieving the fortune of the day. The Highlanders were now busy with the baggage, which offered a more tempting and less troublesome prize than the struggling mass of fugitives. Mackay therefore collected the few men he could get together, and led them across the Garry by a ford above the field of battle over the mountains towards Stirling. On his march he ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris |
