"Incredulity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... admonitions of his retainer with incredulity, though not with any degree of disdain. He knew the devotedness of the old Indian, and therefore treated, what he considered a mere superstition, with a show of respect. But he felt an inclination to ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... that, from their conduct, the advocates of Christianity did not seem to believe in it themselves. Was not this too much for human patience? Would not one suppose that the benign visitants from Europe, provoked at their incredulity and discouraged by their stiff-necked obstinacy, would for ever have abandoned their shores, and consigned them to their original ignorance and misery? But no: so zealous were they to effect the temporal comfort and eternal salvation ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... seemed to be falling in ruins at Undine's feet. A visitor who asked for a girl's mother!—she stared at Mrs. Spragg with cold incredulity. "What ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... paused. I lacked the necessary conviction. After all I was the average citizen, with the average incredulity of the far-fetched, the melodramatic, the absurd. To connect the head waiter's panic at my departure with the episode in my room, to declare that the floor clerks had been called from their posts for a set purpose, ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... no matter of what denomination—for all, in truth, who believe that the Saviour of the world had a good Mother, His only earthly parent, who brought Him forth, nurtured and loved Him. That it should be considered a point of faith with Protestants to treat such memorials with incredulity and even derision, appears to me most inconsistent and unaccountable, though I confess that between these simple primitive memorials and the sumptuous tasteless column and image recently erected at Rome there is a very wide margin of disputable ground, of which I shall say ...
— Legends of the Madonna • Mrs. Jameson
... understanding passed from the brown eyes to the grey, which meant that they were on their mettle. They were not going to defend themselves, but henceforth it was a case of die or produce a good photograph, and so oblige Oswald to alter his tone of scornful incredulity. ...
— About Peggy Saville • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... to the castle till late in the day on which Hilda's child was born. He received the announcement with a look of incredulity on his countenance. ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... people showed the same discretion and reticence as the magistrates. The bigoted believed, the hypocrites pretended to believe; and the worldly-minded, who were numerous, discussed the doctrine of possession in all its phases, and made no secret of their own entire incredulity. They wondered, and not without reason it must be confessed, what had induced the devils to go out of the nuns' bodies for two days only, and then come back and resume possession, to the confusion of the exorcists; further, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - URBAIN GRANDIER—1634 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... stopped as if by shock. There was an electric silence. When she spoke again it was with awe and incredulity and something like terror in ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... took it with a sneer of incredulity and a glance of distrust at the speaker, but neither ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... Ranald, "hadst thou dwelt longer with us, thou wouldst have better learnt to know how to distinguish the accents of truth. To that Saxon lord, and to the Knight of Ardenvohr, I will yield such proofs of what I have spoken, that incredulity shall stand convinced. Meantime, withdraw—I loved thine infancy, I hate not thy youth—no eye hates the rose in its blossom, though it groweth upon a thorn, and for thee only do I something regret what is soon to follow. But he that would avenge him of his foe must not reck ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... showing English colors, with purposes of mutual deception, affecting to belong to the English Navy. For an hour, through their speaking trumpets, the captains equivocally conversed. A very reserved, adroit, hoodwinking, statesman-like conversation, indeed. At last, professing some little incredulity as to the truthfulness of the stranger's statement, Paul intimated a desire that he should put out a boat and come on board to show his commission, to which the stranger very affably replied, that unfortunately his boat was exceedingly leaky. With equal politeness, ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... Bechuanas. Of this method for wantonly destroying animal life, practised by many of the native African tribes, the hunters had often heard. The many stories which they had been told of the wholesale destruction of game by poison, and which they had treated with incredulity, after all, had not been exaggerated. They estimated the number of dead antelopes lying within a circumference of a mile, at not less than two hundred. One of the water-holes of the chain by which they had halted, had been poisoned. A herd ...
— The Giraffe Hunters • Mayne Reid
... 97-98) relates to the mode of regarding events seemingly incredible. This latter is peculiarly distinguished by its good sense and clear statement. It closes with the memorable saying, "Knowledge of divine things for the most part, as Heraclitus says, is lost to us by incredulity."] ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27, January, 1860 • Various
... be really so; and pay that profession of simulated friendship, with an indiscreet and unbounded confidence, always to their loss, often to their ruin. Beware, therefore, now that you are coming into the world, of these preferred friendships. Receive them with great civility, but with great incredulity too; and pay them with compliments, but not with confidence. Do not let your vanity and self-love make you suppose that people become your friends at first sight, or even upon a short acquaintance. Real friendship is a slow grower and never thrives unless ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... books a crowd of typical emblems which revolt us to-day and which exercise our incredulity and our mockery, but which appeared ordinary and simple to ...
— Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary • Voltaire
... great length, without bothering to remove the dead headman. The result was finally a continued respect for Simba, his magic bone, and his ready rifle; but a lingering though polite incredulity as to the matter of Winkleman—Bwana Nyele. It was possible that Simba had killed the latter, of course. But to have taken him alive—and ...
— The Leopard Woman • Stewart Edward White et al
... sniff the scorn with more evident approval than then. He apprehended more thoroughly the character of the man before him, saw more clearly the nature of his business, and wondered with contemptuous incredulity that Balfour had ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... in fact, and it is not much more wise to reject them, than to receive them. The Baron Von Humboldt—a man possessing that rare ingredient of learning, a practical common sense—observes: "That arrogant spirit of incredulity which rejects facts, without attempting to investigate them, is, in some cases, more injurious than an unquestioning credulity."[22] If a popular belief or prejudice be absurd, its traditional preservation for a thousand years or more may very well ...
— Outlines of a Mechanical Theory of Storms - Containing the True Law of Lunar Influence • T. Bassnett
... still his tone was utterly devoid of any emotion save that of incredulity. "You mean you didn't ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... one circumstance in Paoli's character which I present to my readers with caution, knowing how much it may be ridiculed in an age when mankind are so fond of incredulity, that they seem to pique themselves in contracting their circle of belief as much as possible. But I consider this infidel rage as but a temporary mode of the human understanding, and am well persuaded that e'er long we shall return to a more ...
— Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica • James Boswell
... explanations. Zametov had been sitting in the corner, but he rose at the visitors' entrance and was standing in expectation with a smile on his lips, though he looked with surprise and even it seemed incredulity at the whole scene and at Raskolnikov with a certain embarrassment. Zametov's unexpected presence struck ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... smiled slightly. He was a man of some natural politeness, but he found it hard to altogether conceal his incredulity. ...
— The Great Prince Shan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Surprise, incredulity, were now written upon his features. That such an interval should have elapsed since the evening of the free baron's visit appeared incredible. He could not see her countenance as she spoke; only her figure; the upper portion bright, the lower fading into the deep shadows beneath the aperture ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham
... a new epoch of ministerial responsibility to the House of Commons. Among the frequenters of St. James's Street the first thought was how would their own political fortunes be affected. Fox's declaration that an end had come to a political system was received with incredulity. To Selwyn it was a time at once of annoyance and interest. He feared for his sinecure offices; he had, as has been already pointed out, grown accustomed, like many others, to the Administration of the King and ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... Tyrie! Michael Tyrie!" He looked round in astonishment, and not without some fear. It seemed for an instant, as if the evil being, whose existence he had disowned, was about to appear for the punishment of his incredulity. This alarm did not hold him more than an instant, nor did it prevent his replying in a firm voice, "Who ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott
... have told it you before," he said, "but you would not have believed it. Soon—in a very few moments—the news will be known. You will see it break away in waves from that building down there, so I will bear with your incredulity. The German and British fleets have met, and the ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... his fixed regard, as I realized later, there was the glow of love. But this was transformed of an instant into affrighted horror, as my hand at his ear gave the noose the deft and fatal twist. In the space of a single heart-beat, I saw incredulity change to the realization of sudden death, the first wild appeal for pity turn into rigid despair. But this momentary flash of revelation had shown me something else. It was a maid into whose soul I had gazed. I had ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... all Barchester who was not talking of Mr Crawley at that very moment. Then Mr Toogood went with the constable to the private house of the mayor, and had a little conversation with the mayor. "Not guilty!" said the mayor, with incredulity, when he first heard the news about Crawley. But when he heard Mr Toogood's story, or as much of it as it was necessary that he should hear, he yielded reluctantly. "Dear, dear!" he said. "I'd have bet anything 'twas he who stole it." And after that he mayor was quite sad. Only ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope
... was curious. Fielding's face was a blank surprise, and his mouth opened to say no, but he caught Dicky's look and the word was not uttered. The Pasha's face showed curious incredulity; under the pallor of the Lost One's a purplish flush crept, stayed a moment, then faded away, and left ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the Colonel,—why, he has received it." Trevelyan had become white with rage when Bozzle first mentioned this continued correspondence between his wife and Colonel Osborne. It never occurred to him to doubt the correctness of the policeman's information, and he regarded Stanbury's assertion of incredulity as being simply of a piece with his general obstinacy in the matter. At this moment he began to regret that he had called in the assistance of his friend, and that he had not left the affair altogether in the hands of that much more satisfactory, but still more ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... sound broke on our ears. It seemed to come through the keyhole, and resembled the contemptuous sniff with which Elizabeth always expresses incredulity. But, of course, it couldn't have ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... Spartans bore him, by private and pecuniary negotiations with the ephors. At length, however, such decided and unequivocal intelligence of the progress of the walls arrived at Sparta, that the ephors could no longer feel or affect incredulity. ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... me!" shouted the stranger. "Is it loaded?" With his cheek pressed to the stock and his eye squinted down the length of the brown barrel, Jimmie nodded. The stranger flung up his open palms. They accented his expression of amazed incredulity. He seemed to be exclaiming, "Can ...
— The Boy Scout and Other Stories for Boys • Richard Harding Davis
... a long, low whistle of incredulity, then proceeded to resurrect and read a carbon copy ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... seemed to Arethusa to be one of incredulity, so she turned back her shirtwaist cuff to prove her statement, and showed the end ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... impression. It excited the astonishment and incredulity of every one. He had made a distinct charge that Greeley's opposition was the revenge of a disappointed office-seeker, and the public, resenting the imputation, demanded the evidence. Greeley himself echoed the prayer by a blast ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... the person addressed is marked out as distinct from certain others, by putting it upon rode other means of locomotion to Newmarket are excluded, and so on. With the same order of words five interrogative sentences may also be expressed, and a third series of exclamatory sentences expressing anger, incredulity, &c., may be obtained from the same words. It is to be noticed that for these two series a different intonation, a different musical (pitch) accent appears from that which is found in the same words when employed to make a ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... suited her rather fragile features, too. Also she had become curiously considerate of other people's feelings—rather subdued; less ready in her criticisms; gentler in judgments. All of which symptoms Constance had already noted with incredulity and alarm. ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... the old woman could give him no information; she could only suggest that the ghosts must to a certainty have had something to do with it. When he replied that he did not believe in such things, she answered that they had evidently carried off his daughter to punish him for his incredulity, and to prove their existence to him. He hurried round from cottage to cottage, but the people only opened their eyes and mouths wide with astonishment, and gave him no information likely to be of the ...
— Washed Ashore - The Tower of Stormount Bay • W.H.G. Kingston
... Romans believed! Religion pervades every step of the early Roman history; and in a great degree down at least to the Empire; but, because their religion is not our religion, we pass over the supernatural part of the matter in silence, or advert to it in a spirit of contemptuous incredulity. We do not give it its proper place, nor present it in its proper colours, as a cause in the production of great effects. Therefore, I like to read Livy, and I do not like ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... though, as you know, in secret societies the humble man may be a chief and director—the ostensible leader but a puppet moved by unseen hands. Never mind who was chief, or who was second. Never mind my age. It boots not to tell it: why shall I expose myself to your scornful incredulity—or reply to your questions in words that are familiar to you, but which you cannot understand? Words are symbols of things which you know, or of things which you don't know. If you don't know them, to speak is idle." (Here I confess Mr. P. spoke for exactly ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... every alleged method of help and hope into doubt. Indignation, without any calming faith in justice, and self-contempt, without any curative self-reproach, dull the intelligence, and degrade the conscience, into sullen incredulity of all sunshine outside the dunghill, or breeze beyond the wafting of its impurity; and at last a philosophy develops itself, partly satiric, partly consolatory, concerned only with the regenerative vigour of manure, and the ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... name of "The Mysteries of Jesus," so familiar in the ears of the Christians of the first centuries, would come with a shock of surprise on those of their modern successors, and, if spoken as denoting a special and definite institution in the Early Church, would cause a smile of incredulity. It has actually been made a matter of boast that Christianity has no secrets, that whatever it has to say it says to all, and whatever it has to teach it teaches to all. Its truths are supposed to be so simple, that "a ...
— Esoteric Christianity, or The Lesser Mysteries • Annie Besant
... excusable upon particular emergent occasions, with some heat of language to express dislike of notorious wickedness. As our Lord doth against the perverse incredulity and stupidity in the Pharisees, their profane misconstruction of His words and actions, their malicious opposing truth, and obstructing His endeavours in God's service. As St. Peter did to Simon Magus, telling him that ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... against," said Stanley to me after the consomme had been served. "Now that we've actually sailed, there's no longer any need for secrecy. Indeed there never has been urgent need of it: the Professor and myself merely thought we might provoke incredulity and comment if we stated the purpose ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... particular case, the fits (of vomiting nails, needles, deposed by other witnesses) might be natural, only raised to a great degree by the subtlety of the devil cooperating with the malice of the witches, employs a well-known argument when he declares ('Religio Medici'), 'Those that to confute their incredulity desire to see apparitions shall questionless never behold any. The devil hath these already in a heresy as capital as witchcraft; and to appear to them ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... a slang expression, used to express incredulity. It has somewhat the same meaning as the slang phrase heard in ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... her fingers tighten over his in spasmodic incredulity and saw the stunned look in her eyes, but she only said steadily, "Go on ... I knows ye hed ter do ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... looked at him with almost contemptuous incredulity. "My dear fellow, what is the use of denying facts? You can't make black white, can you? Day before yesterday you loved this—this," he seemed to search for some epithet; glanced at David, and said, almost meekly: "girl. Day before yesterday she expected to marry you. To-day she ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... like?" interrogated Snowball, in an accent that proclaimed incredulity. "Was 'um ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... preserved in St. Peter's, at Rome; but the story is to us rather apocryphal. At St. Alban's they show you the dust of the good Duke Humphrey: we once begged a pinch, which the guide granted freely; this induced us to ask him how often he re-supplied the dust: the man stared at our ungrateful incredulity. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 563, August 25, 1832 • Various
... good policy for deterring the attempt. There has not been one of the great alterations effected by the popular spirit within the last half-century, that was not preceded by professions of contemptuous incredulity, on the part of the applauders of things as they were, toward those who calculated on the effects of that spirit. There were occasionally betrayed, under these shows of confidence and contempt, some signs of horror at the undeniable ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster
... stammered Ivan, in a flutter of excitement and incredulity, "it is impossible! Conduct!—I cannot do it! ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... then?" his comrade retorted with greater incredulity. "If both doors were closed and fastenings are all right now, could anybody get the car out? They left the big ...
— Pee-wee Harris on the Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... with every one of them. Although Roswell's reading was directed by the marks of Mary, all of which had reference to those passages that touched on the Divinity of the Saviour, he made no comments that betrayed his incredulity. There is a simple earnestness in the narrative portions of the Gospel that commends its truth to every mind, and it had its effect on that of Roswell Gardiner; though it failed to remove doubts that had so long been cherished, and which had their existence in pride of reason, ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... used as fly-traps. There is no perceptible odor to draw insects, except what arises from the decomposition of macerated victims; nor is any kind of lure to be detected at the mouth of the pitcher of the common purple-flowered species. Some incredulity was therefore natural when it was stated by a Carolinian correspondent (Mr. B.F. Grady) that in the long-leaved, yellow-flowered species the lid just above the mouth of the tubular pitcher habitually secretes drops of a sweet and ...
— Darwiniana - Essays and Reviews Pertaining to Darwinism • Asa Gray
... there was not much business going on in the bank. The paying teller and the receiving teller listened to the questions and answers. The receiving teller was a young man, and his face wore a sneering look of incredulity. He regarded Frank with open doubt, and, once or twice, muttered, "Ridiculous!" "Nonsense!" "A clever lie!" ...
— Frank Merriwell's Bravery • Burt L. Standish
... morality of their preceptors, begin by feeling something like the implicit credulity of Anthonio; but the arts of the preceptors are quickly suspected by their subjects, and the charm is for ever reversed. When once a child detects you in falsehood, you lose his confidence; his incredulity will then be as extravagant as his former belief was gratuitous. It is in vain to expect, by the most eloquent manifestoes, or by the most secret leagues offensive and defensive, to conceal your real views, sentiments, and actions, ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... exceed the interest and curiosity of the two physicians. They looked at the vial and asked questions almost without number. The old familiar look of incredulity crept into their eyes when they came to an understanding of the immateriality of the dose. They were familiar with the dogma of "Similia similibus curanter," or "Like cures like," and repudiated it at once. But they said ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman
... struck me like a blow in the face. Allan Morris had spoken of a mocking person who jeered and smiled. And that described this man exactly. There was mockery in every glance of his dull eyes; every twitch of his mouth was a fleer; with each gesture he seemed making game of one; sneering incredulity was ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Investigator • John T. McIntyre
... her that they were not so common as to be walked upon or shovelled up by the ton, but that they were really and truly diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and emeralds, in their natural uncut state, she would scarcely believe it. Even my mother expressed her incredulity with the remark, "Go along, boy! I suppose we shall not know a turnip from an ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... inventor has almost become coupled with that of anxiety, patient or impatient waiting, trials, and hardships. They are usually enthusiasts in the special pursuit to which they devote themselves, and the coldness and incredulity of those whose approval they seek to win, wear heavily upon them. The chilling common-sense of men more practical than themselves ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... and habit long lie in company it is only slowly and with incredulity that habit awakens to find its ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... portraits and common life, but must attempt the heroic;—failed signally; and what is worse, carried a whole nation blundering after him. Had you told a Frenchman so, twenty years ago, he would have thrown the dementi in your teeth; or, at least, laughed at you in scornful incredulity. They say of us that we don't know when we are beaten: they go a step further, and swear their defeats are victories. David was a part of the glory of the empire; and one might as well have said then that "Romulus" ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... and tomorrow I may fail to convince the world, but the day after it will begin to reason and to doubt. If we do not oppose this quack with a strong phalanx of learned men, we shall be sneered at for our previous incredulity. Now I adhere to my text. Therese von Paradies is blind, and no one shall prove to me that she can see. Come to my study, and let us talk ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... received with incredulity—but gained ground, as people began to notice that several packages were being taken in boats from the farm-house to both the Eulalie and the Valkyrie. These preparations excited a great deal ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... of promotion. My very first, or at least second letter, undeceived him in those views, and our correspondence(298) was broken off before he quitted his aster's business at Bristol-so that his disappointment with me was but his first ill success; and he resented my incredulity so much, that he never condescended to let me see him. Indeed, what I have said now to you, and which cannot be controverted by a shadow of a doubt, would be sufficient vindication. I could only add to the proofs, a vain regret of never ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... starts as if stricken to the center, for a moment his features express amazement, then incredulity, and ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter
... on the Continent, so many false reports and lying bulletins were fabricated at Hamburgh, that at length, when any one would signify his disbelief of a statement, he would say, 'You had that from Hamburgh;' and thus, 'That is Hamburgh,' or Humbug, became a common expression of incredulity." ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 191, June 25, 1853 • Various
... face of every one of our friends, as they saw this image of the Sky-Bird II cross the sky overhead and disappear in the mists beyond, was a look of amazement, incredulity, and ...
— Around the World in Ten Days • Chelsea Curtis Fraser
... it alone justifies, it is evident that by no outward work or labour can the inward man be at all justified, made free, and saved; and that no works whatever have any relation to him. And so, on the other hand, it is solely by impiety and incredulity of heart that he becomes guilty and a slave of sin, deserving condemnation, not by any outward sin or work. Therefore the first care of every Christian ought to be to lay aside all reliance on works, and strengthen ...
— Concerning Christian Liberty - With Letter Of Martin Luther To Pope Leo X. • Martin Luther
... and the younger people were quick to perceive a slight restraint in her words. It was quite natural. A mother, weighing the actions of others in a matter touching the safety of her son, would hardly make allowance for the incredulity such a messenger as Sobieski would inspire, and Beaumanoir tactfully led the talk to a less ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... Fitch arrived. At the moment of his arrival Jasper was in a handsome chamber on the second floor, which had been assigned to his use, preparing himself for dinner. Mr. Fitch was overjoyed at the recovery of his little boy, but he listened with some incredulity to the praises lavished upon ...
— Frank and Fearless - or The Fortunes of Jasper Kent • Horatio Alger Jr.
... however, their statement that no one at first hoped that the words would be made good; and he proceeds to account for the extraordinary belief which, in spite of this original incredulity, grew up, and changed the course of things and the face of the world. We admire and respect many things in M. Renan; but it seems to us that his treatment of this matter is simply the ne plus ultra of the degradation ...
— Occasional Papers - Selected from The Guardian, The Times, and The Saturday Review, - 1846-1890 • R.W. Church
... and no interest can pervert. I have shewn that the universe bears witness to the inspiration of its historian, by the revolution of its orbs and the succession of its seasons; that the stars in their courses fight against[1083] incredulity, that the works of GOD give hourly confirmation to the law, the prophets, and the gospel, of which one day telleth another, and one night certifieth another[1084]; and that the validity of the sacred writings can never be denied, while the moon shall increase and wane, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... without breaking it; that the houses were as high as mountains, and so large, that he had walked three days in one of them without coming to the end of it. It was evident that Lauri had stretched a little; but Nomahanna had no notion of incredulity. She approved of our inventions for warming the inside of our houses, and thought, that if she were at Petersburg, she would not go out at all during the cold weather, but would drive her carriage about the house. She inquired how ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue
... tramp with good-humoured incredulity. "Where's your diamond pin? Where's your rings?" He seemed willing to prolong the playful inquiry. "Where's your ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... shock proved too much for the captain. For the first time there was distinct incredulity ...
— The Box with Broken Seals • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... when somebody lighted a lamp Lewson sat down stupidly and looked at them. His face was gaunt and almost blackened by exposure to the frost, his hair was long, and tattered garments of greasy skins hung about him. There was something that suggested bewildered incredulity in his eyes. ...
— Masters of the Wheat-Lands • Harold Bindloss
... was Adiron-dack gneiss, and had been brought from that region on the back, or in the maw, of a glacier, many tens of thousands of years ago. But it is highly probable that, were he an uneducated man, he would have treated my statement with contempt or incredulity. Education does at least this for a man: it opens his mind and makes him less skeptical about things not dreamed ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs
... in the "House of Fame"), his good sense and his piety alike revolted against extravagant astrological speculations. He certainly does not wish to go as far as the honest carpenter in the "Miller's Tale," who glories in his incredulity of aught besides his credo, and who yet is afterwards befooled by the very impostor of whose astrological pursuits he had reprehended the impiety. "Men," he says, "should know nothing of that which is private to God. Yea, blessed be alway a simple man who knows nothing but only his belief." ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward
... remorselessly pressed the fact that he did not believe that the blood of St. Januarius reliquefies miraculously every year, the Credo stuck in his throat like Amen in Macbeth's. He had got down at last to his irreducible minimum of dogmatic incredulity, and could not, even with the mouth of the bottomless pit yawning before Belloc, utter the ...
— G. K. Chesterton, A Critical Study • Julius West
... according to their usual ill-fortune, helped to precipitate their ruin, next called forth the public gratulation of the poet-laureate. This was the birth of that "son of prayers" prophesied in the dedication to Xavier, whom the English, with obstinate incredulity, long chose to consider as an impostor, grafted upon the royal line to the prejudice of the Protestant succession. Dryden's "Britannia Rediviva" hailed, with the enthusiasm of a Catholic and a poet, the very event which, removing ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott
... misfortune. I know people often say, a man denies God when by his own conduct he has brought himself into a condition in which he may well desire that God does not exist. In this way he is made guilty, or, in a sense, responsible for his incredulity. For myself, Monseigneur, I have consulted my conscience with an entire sincerity; and although my youth has been amiss, I am certain that my atheism proceeds from no sentiment of personal interest. On the contrary, I may tell you with truth that the day on which I perceived my faith ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater
... some feature of the experience was missing from his written account, he could not identify the omission. But one memory arose starkly before him—that of the cowled man who had stood behind the curtains. It had power to chill him yet. The old incredulity returned and methodically he re-examined the contents of some of the table drawers. Ere long, however, ...
— The Golden Scorpion • Sax Rohmer
... click again, and the pens and pencils scratched on to the accompaniment of murmurs and whispers and occasional grunts and snorts of incredulity. By a master-stroke of strategy Franklin Marmion had, in placing the three demonstrations of the long-supposed impossible before them in quick succession, kept the learned, but now utterly bewildered mathematicians so busy that they literally ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... master did: he judged human nature so meanly that one is ashamed to have to own that he was right, and that men could be corrupted by means so base. But, with his hireling House of Commons, he defended liberty for us; with his incredulity he kept Church-craft down. There were parsons at Oxford as double-dealing and dangerous as any priests out of Rome, and he routed them both. He gave Englishmen no conquests, but he gave them peace, and ease, and freedom; the three per cents nearly at par; and ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... curious, cloudy sort of argument, much affected by the professional rhetoricians of Prussia, who are sent out to instruct and correct the minds of Americans or Scandinavians. It consists of going into convulsions of incredulity and scorn at the mention of Russia's responsibility for Servia or England's responsibility for Belgium; and suggesting that, treaty or no treaty, frontier or no frontier, Russia would be out to slay Teutons or England to steal colonies. Here, as elsewhere, I ...
— The Appetite of Tyranny - Including Letters to an Old Garibaldian • G.K. Chesterton
... was wasted, for the sudden and unusual, although a familiar sound, had caught Hopalong's ear and he was giving all his attention to it. While he weighed it, his incredulity holding back the decision his common sense was striving to give him, the noise grew louder rapidly and common sense won out in a cry of warning an instant before a five-foot wall of brown water burst upon his sight, sweeping swiftly down the old, dry river bed; and behind it towered another ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... low whistle, but his companion could not tell whether it was an expression of regret or incredulity. If they had stood on an equality, Tom would probably have suggested that the figures should be interpreted "over the left"—an idiosyncrasy in language which he had imported from Pinchbrook, but which may not be wholly unintelligible to our ...
— The Soldier Boy; or, Tom Somers in the Army - A Story of the Great Rebellion • Oliver Optic
... knew very well he had no intention of doing this, and Hannah did not attempt to conceal her incredulity. As a matter of fact, Lise sometimes did insist ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... succeeded in finding some. He brought them to Florence, where he holds them in great veneration, as well as some other things in his possession, also by Giotto, who produced so much that an enumeration of all his works would excite incredulity. It is not many years since that I happened to be at the hermitage of Camaldoli, where I have done a number of things for the fathers, and in a cell to which I was taken by the Very Rev. Don Antonio da Pisa, then general of the congregation of Camaldoli, I saw a very beautiful crucifix, on a ...
— The Lives of the Painters, Sculptors & Architects, Volume 1 (of 8) • Giorgio Vasari
... the weaknesses which little men rail against, there is none that they are more apt to ridicule than the tendency to believe. And of all the signs of a corrupt heart and a feeble head, the tendency of incredulity is the surest. ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... was of a nature to corroborate all that Joam Dacosta had said on the subject of Torres, and of the bargain which he had endeavored to make, Judge Jarriquez could not restrain a smile of incredulity. ...
— Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon • Jules Verne
... done?" There was no gladness in her voice, only relief. Doubt was in every intonation of her sentence; incredulity in ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... Miss Beverley," interrupted Mrs Delvile, with a look of arch incredulity, "men seldom risk their lives where an escape is without hope of recompence. But we will not now say a word more upon the subject. I hope you will often favour me with your company, and by the frequency of your visits, make us both ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... disinterested person was needed to report upon the prisons and etapes which had been described as hells upon earth, and to either confirm or gainsay the statements made by the American traveller. The evidence of a Russian subject would, for obvious reasons, have met with incredulity, and it came to pass, therefore, that through the agency of Madame de Novikoff, herself a prison Directress, I was selected for a task, which although extremely interesting, subjected me to much unfavourable criticism on my return to England. Some yellow journals even went so far ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... such a wreck of modern literature as that of the ancient, should intervene, to identify the real circumstances, moral and civil, of the man? And will a true historian, such as the Evangelists, be credited at that future period against such a predominant incredulity, without large and mighty accessions of collateral attestation? And how transcendently extraordinary, I had almost said miraculous, will it be estimated by candid and reasonable minds, that a writer whose object was a melioration of condition to the common people, and their deliverance ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... Etienne turned pale, and gazed as if to make sure he did not behold a ghost or a vampire—gazed like one startled out of his self possession, and the first emotion which succeeded was sheer incredulity; there was small trace of the once fair-haired English boy in the sunburnt, storm-beaten warrior of fifty to ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... to me—so suddenly, so unexpectedly, did it come at last! I admit there is no excuse for my incredulity, except that of thinking your dear father had been so strangely deprived of his well-earned reward through the injustice of man on so many occasions, because, far better things than man could ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... Didn' I had to run from Bras-Coupe in de haidge of de swamp be'ine de 'abitation of my cousin Honore, one time? You can hask 'oo you like!" (A Creole always provides against incredulity.) At this point he digressed a moment: "You know my cousin, Honore Grandissime, w'at give two hund' fifty dolla' to de 'ospill laz mont'? An' juz because my cousin Honore give it, somebody helse give de semm. Fo' w'y don't ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... out in a harsh laugh that was partly amusement, but mostly hysterical. Both he and the captain regarded McCoy with incredulity and amazement. That this barefooted beachcomber should possess such high-sounding dignity was inconceivable. His cotton shirt, unbuttoned, exposed a grizzled chest and the fact that there ...
— South Sea Tales • Jack London
... gasped with astonishment. For a moment gloomy incredulity, suspicion, delight, pride, admiration, even affection, struggled for mastery in his sullen, staring eyes and open, twitching mouth. For here was Clarence Brant, handsomer than ever, more superior than ever, in the majesty of uniform and authority which fitted him—the younger man—by reason ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte
... of the physical earth, and the other, aiming to discover the antiquity, differences of race, and social and ethnical development of man, have obtained results which we cannot regard without amazement and more or less incredulity. The two sciences have been faithful handmaidens the one to the other; but geology has always led the way, and archaeology has been competed to follow in ...
— The Nation in a Nutshell • George Makepeace Towle
... this incredulity about "masters" of thought like the history of philosophy. The professor of moral philosophy, Mr. Ferrier, was a famous metaphysician and scholar. His lectures on "The History of Greek Philosophy" were an admirable ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang
... ready to cross the frontier at the first hint of a warrant being out against him.[136] Diderot has recorded his admiration of his friend's work. "I am disgusted," he said, "with the modern fashion of mixing up incredulity and superstition. What I like is a philosophy that is clear, definite, and frank, such as you have in the System of Nature. The author is not an atheist in one page, and a deist in another. His philosophy ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley
... at Arica, the boys were conducted at once to the governor—a stern and haughty-looking Spaniard, who received the account given by the captain with an air of incredulity. ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... letter written on his third voyage, pays an honest, heartfelt tribute to the effectual patronage which he experienced from the queen. "In the midst of the general incredulity," says he, "the Almighty infused into the queen, my lady, the spirit of intelligence and energy; and, whilst every one else, in his ignorance, was expatiating only on the inconvenience and cost, her Highness approved it, on the contrary, and gave it ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... characters graven so deeply by the stylus of Clio upon so many monumental tablets, and almost as indelibly and quite as painfully upon school-boy memory, to be sponged out at a blow, like chalk from a blackboard? We, at least, cling fondly to our Tarquins; we shudder when the abyss of historic incredulity swallows up the familiar form of Mettus Curtius; we refuse to be weaned from the she-wolf of Romulus. Your unbelieving Guy Faux, who approaches the stately superstructures of history, not to gaze upon them with the eye of faith ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... through the capillary tubes of the great female confabulation;" of "devouring ideas distilled through a bald forehead;" of a "lover's enwrapping his mistress in the wadding of his attentions;" of "abortions in which the spawn of genius cumbers an arid strand;" of the "philosophic moors of incredulity;" of a "town troubled in its ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton |
