"Inexcusable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was, till I discovered myself to him. Seignor, said I, in Portuguese, don't you know me? He spoke never a word, but giving his musket to his attendant, extended his arms, and saying something in Spanish that I did not then understand, he came forward & embraced me, saying, he was inexcusable not to know his deliverer: who, like an angel sent from heaven, had saved his life; He then beckoned to the man to call out his companions, asking me if I would walk to my own habitation and take possession, where I should find some mean improvements; ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe
... king to have been successfully resisted by the pope, unless the pope was backed by a union of the Christian princes, which was then impracticable. That fact may make the execution of More, Fisher and the Charterhouse monks inexcusable, but it by no means proves that Henry would have been strong enough to maintain his position if the monasteries had been permitted to exist as centers of organized opposition to his will. Many of the monks, when pressed by the king's agents, took the oath of allegiance. Threats, ...
— A Short History of Monks and Monasteries • Alfred Wesley Wishart
... thirty despotic rulers in the city, in their ruin now they began to turn to those thoughts which, while safety was yet possible, they would not entertain; they acknowledged and bewailed their former errors and follies, and judged this second ill-usage of Alcibiades to be of all the most inexcusable. For he was rejected, without any fault committed by himself; and only because they were incensed against his subordinate for having shamefully lost a few ships, they much more shamefully deprived the commonwealth of its most valiant and accomplished ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... To me they are apparent enough—yet I am far from thinking either piece perfect, though with what faults they have, I hold them in the first rank of genius and poetry. The second strophe of the first Ode is inexcusable, nor do I wonder your Lordship blames it; even when one does understand it, perhaps the last line is too turgid. I am not fond of the antistrophe that follows. In the second Ode he made some corrections for the worse. Brave Urion ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... been long excluded. It was most unfair to impute to a great party the faults of a few individuals. Even among the Bishops of the Established Church James had found tools and sycophants. The conduct of Cartwright and Parker had been much more inexcusable than that of Alsop and Lobb. Yet those who held the dissenters answerable for the errors of Alsop and Lobb would doubtless think it most unreasonable to hold the Church answerable for the far deeper guilt ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... The brief lyric, above all other kinds of poetry, should be finished in form and expression. The imperfections of diction that might go unchallenged in a longer poem are inexcusable in a lyric. Delicacy of thought and intensity of feeling constitute its breath of life, and should mold for themselves a beauteous form. What is commonplace, harsh, or unmusical in expression should be ...
— Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism • F. V. N. Painter
... Netherland now called West. Chester, to declare that the inhabitants were absolved from their allegiance to the Dutch government, to dismiss the old magistrates and to appoint others in their stead. These were high-handed measures, apparently inexcusable. ...
— Peter Stuyvesant, the Last Dutch Governor of New Amsterdam • John S. C. Abbott
... "You are going too far, my dear boy. Stupidity is not the proper word at all; you should say carelessness, thoughtlessness. You are young—what else could one expect? What is far less inexcusable is the manner in which you conducted the chase, after the prisoner was ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... sadly regret inexcusable escape of livestock. While petting same, one of our children monkied (sp?) with airlock. Will not happen again. Regret also imperfect grasp of language, learned through what you term Television etc. Animal not dangerous, but observe some accidental damage caused, therefore hasten to enclose reimbursement, ...
— The Good Neighbors • Edgar Pangborn
... as indicated, is of a less creditable nature. After the terrible crossing of the Beresina, when, through faulty generalship and inexcusable want of forethought, thousands upon thousands of lives were needlessly sacrificed, the Emperor, during the wretched bivouac west of the river, was, like the rest of his regiment, suffering intensely from the bitter weather. ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)
... three questions which are implied when you ask, "Ought I to marry?" First, "Have I a right to marry?" Every young person should ask this question. Fitness includes several aspects, among which the first is physical. The most inexcusable unfitness is venereal disease. There is no meaner crime than for a young man to acquire venereal disease by reason of weakness of will, and then pass it on to an innocent girl and perhaps to unborn children. Physicians say that ...
— The Good Housekeeping Marriage Book • Various
... is the frequent use of obscure terms, which by the women are called hard words, and by the better sort of vulgar, fine language; than which I do not know a more universal, inexcusable, and unnecessary mistake, among the clergy of all distinctions, but especially the younger practitioners. I have been curious enough to take a list of several hundred words in a sermon of a new beginner, which not one of his hearers among a hundred could possibly understand, neither can ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... like an anaconda, dwell on the small worries and grow angry at the least trifle, you are committing as great and inexcusable a folly as if you flung your furniture and garments and food and fuel into the sea in a spirit of wanton cruelty. You are wasting life for nothing. Every sick, gloomy day you pass is a sin against life. Get health, be ...
— The Heart of the New Thought • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... is that the United States Government during the six years from 1791 to 1796 behaved shamefully to the people who were settled along the Cumberland and Holston. This was the more inexcusable in view of the fact that, thanks to the example of Blount, Sevier, and Robertson, the Tennesseeans, alone among the frontiersmen, showed an intelligent appreciation of the benefits of the Union and a readiness to render it loyal support. The Kentuckians ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt
... Felix, you can—you will be able. And you are not to stay here for my sake—you mustn't. I could never be sure that it would prove of any help to me to have you give up a plan which you have taken hold of with such enthusiasm. I think it would be inexcusable of you to draw back, and wicked of me to permit it. You must be happy at having found a way at last, by which you may reach all you have longed for. It makes me happy, too, Felix. If you missed this opportunity, you would ...
— The Lonely Way—Intermezzo—Countess Mizzie - Three Plays • Arthur Schnitzler
... were elements about it inexcusable," says the old squire, beating his hand upon the table as though to ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown
... vogue among people whose Christianity and civilisation are unquestionable, a lie may sometimes be honourable. However casuists may argue, the world is agreed that a lie for saving life and even property under certain circumstances, and for screening the honour of a confiding woman, is not inexcusable. The goldsmith's son who died with a lie on his lips for saving the Prince Chevalier did a meritorious act. The owner also who hides his property from robbers, cannot be regarded ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... eyes. She felt that Mary was justified in disapproving of what she had done the day before; for she herself had been unable to sleep and had become more and more convinced that she had acted wrongly, nay, unpardonably. And now again she had done an inexcusable thing. She felt that she had deeply hurt the child's feelings, and this sincerely grieved her. She followed Mary in silence, at some little distance, like a maid-servant. She longed to hold her back by her dress, to say something kind to her, nay, to ask her pardon. As ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... be inexcusable in coming after such a person with any detail, if a great part of the members who now fill the House had not the misfortune to be absent when he appeared at your bar. Besides, Sir, I propose to take the matter at periods of time somewhat different from his. There is, if I mistake ...
— Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America • Edmund Burke
... and you have no right to doubt it. You have no right." She caught her breath sharply, and then went on with inexcusable harshness: "Even if there hadn't been any one else, I should never—I ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... young man. I can say that my crime is not a punishable one, and yet I feel that I am deserving of censure. You may think so also, but I will say this much: I will pay a large sum of money to rectify. What I say as concerns myself is a case of inexcusable negligence." ...
— Two Wonderful Detectives - Jack and Gil's Marvelous Skill • Harlan Page Halsey
... renounced, and for ever, any pretensions to that title which the constitution might give him. "After having made so many sacrifices to the cause of the people," he said, "I am no longer in a condition to quit my position as a simple citizen. Ambition in me would be an inexcusable inconsistency." ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... explanation. "I wrote to him about you and Septimius Severus.... Don't you recollect? And I cautioned him particularly not to tell Gwen.... Why not? Why—of course not! It was sheer, inexcusable dishonesty, and I shall tell him so next ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... closely examine the figure of the saint, and was deeply troubled. She said to herself, "No, no." She refused; she would not give herself the pleasure of accepting. It would be inexcusable on her part thus to be an accomplice in a plan, for it was evident that Felicien was keeping something back. She was perfectly sure that he was not poor, and that he wore a workman's dress simply as a disguise; ...
— The Dream • Emile Zola
... convinced that the learned gentleman who charges me with irregularity, is better acquainted than myself with the rules and customs of this house, which I have studied with great application, assisted by long experience. I hope, therefore, it will be no inexcusable presumption, if, instead of a tacit submission to his censure, I assert, in my own vindication, that I have not deviated from the established rules of the senate, that I have spoken only in defence of merit ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 10. - Parlimentary Debates I. • Samuel Johnson
... between Talma and Geoffroy which had occurred a few days before his arrival. The Emperor, although he had a high opinion of Talma, thought him completely in the wrong, and repeated several times, "A man of his age! A man of his age! that is inexcusable. Zounds!" added he, smiling, "do not people speak evil of me also? Have I not also critics who do not spare me? He should not be more sensitive than I?" This affair, however, had no disagreeable result for Talma; for the ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... I thought to myself, as I followed her. "It could only have been in a moment of inexcusable thoughtlessness that Nature gave a child to such a giddy ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... and in calicoes—the good patterns which are printed on common linens—have made it quite inexcusable for people to dress ill. Some of the prettiest costumes that we have seen have been made in cheap materials, and persons who have admired them have been quite astonished to find that they have bestowed their admiration upon an ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge
... duties and the requirements of the gospel; and hence, too, it is, that Gerrit Smith is right, in asserting that the demoralized condition of the great mass of the free colored people, in our cities, is inexcusable, and deserving of the utmost reprobation, because it is voluntary—they knowing their duty but abandoning themselves ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... Compunction, and in his last Scenes; which could not have been made, had either of them been painted as sentimental Unbelievers. Not to say, that Clarissa, whose great Objection to Mr. Wyerly was, that he was a Scoffer, must have been inexcusable had she known Lovelace to be so, and had given the least attention to his Addresses. On the contrary, thus she comforts herself, when she thinks she must be his—'This one consolation, however, remains: He is not an Infidel, an Unbeliever. ...
— Clarissa: Preface, Hints of Prefaces, and Postscript • Samuel Richardson
... one's eyes this curtain—the carnal fancy of a temporal kingdom for Christ, an earthly government for his Church—the Scriptures cannot be understood. As Paul says of the Jews (2 Cor 3, 14), the veil remaineth in the reading of the Scriptures. But this lack of understanding is inexcusable. That is gross and wilful blindness which will not receive the instruction and direction imparted by the apostles. The Jews continue to rave against the Gospel; they will hear nothing of the Christ, though even after crucifying him they receive the offer of repentance and remission ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther
... joy,—I trust it was suppressed,—I heard the duke exclaim that this was General Le Cazeau, due to visit the hospital with his staff and greet the wounded and bestow on certain lucky beings the reward of their valor in the shape of medals of war. Obviously, it would have been inexcusable for the master and mistress of Raincy-la-Tour to ignore a visitor so distinguished. I made no protest whatever as they turned ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... gracious Prince prompts, sanctions, supports, and openly rewards this envenomer, in flat contempt of both Houses of Parliament,—protects and prefers him and others of the same principles and professions on account of these professions! And the Parliament and nation were inexcusable, forsooth, in not trusting to Charles's assurances, or rather the assurances put in his mouth by Hyde, Falkland, and others, that he had ...
— The Literary Remains Of Samuel Taylor Coleridge • Edited By Henry Nelson Coleridge
... fallacy the more inexcusable because Malthus and all his followers were surrounded by a society the conditions of which absolutely refuted their theory. They had only to open then eyes to see that wherever the poverty and squalor chiefly abounded, which they vaunted as such valuable checks to population, ...
— Equality • Edward Bellamy
... girl of medium height, light of frame, with a face in whose sad beauty is blended the least perceptible trace of womanly resolution. She has borne the heaviest sorrow; for when she followed her father to the grave she buried the last object of her love. The long, inexcusable silence of Greenleaf had been explained to her; she now believed him faithless, and had (not without a pang) striven to uproot his memory from her heart. Courageous, but with more than the delicacy of her sex, strong ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various
... to say that when any officer has the inexcusable fault that he takes snap judgment on his own men, he will not be any different in his relations with all other people, and will stand in his own light for the duration of his career. Which leads to one other ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... of him, the excellences of intellect and character were combined in fuller measure. Of my personal feeling towards him I cannot speak. I am ashamed to have been compelled, by what I can only describe as an inexcusable insult, to say what I have said." It was not difficult to show that Freeman's four articles in The Contemporary Review contained worse blunders than any he had attributed to Froude, as, for instance, the ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... of heart there is none so inexcusable as that of parents toward their children. An obstinate, inflexible, unforgiving temper is odious upon all occasions; but ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various
... revolved in his direction. His temples were grey! She had not noted this change till now. Grey; and the face, tanned even in the shaven jaws, was careworn. There was a gesture which escaped his notice. Why had she been guilty of the inexcusable madness, the inexplicable ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... colour and the soft smoothness of a damson), he animadverted upon the astounding negligence of women. There were Nellie (his wife), his mother, the nurse, the cook, the maid—five of them; and in his mind they had all plotted together—a conspiracy of carelessness—to leave the inexcusable tool in his lobby for him to stumble over. What was the use of accidentally procuring ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... begged pardon for the mistake. It was inexcusable, he admitted. He had heard the captain's name mentioned so frequently since his arrival in Bayport, especially by Mrs. Berry and her daughter, "so favorably, even enthusiastically mentioned," that he certainly should have remembered it. "I am ...
— Fair Harbor • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... with some small degree of relish, and has some trifling satisfaction in the enjoyment, but, in this, the farther we go, the more we are lost; and when arrived at the mark proposed, we are as far from the object we pursue, as when we first set out. Here then, are we inexcusable, in not attending to the secret dictates of reason, and in stopping our ears at the timely admonitions of friendship. Headstrong and ungovernable, we pursue our course without intermission; thoughtless and unwary, ...
— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler
... I cannot tell you. It is difficult for a woman to define her feelings in language which is chiefly made by men to express theirs. My treatment of you was thoughtless, inexcusable, wicked! I shall eternally regret it. If there had been anything I could have done to make amends I would most gladly have done it—there was nothing on earth I so longed to do as to repair the error. But that ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... society and all, to go to a mud-chinked hovel at that ghastly spot where the Indians danced and coyotes howled the live-long night? Of course if there were quarters in which a woman could live with even reasonable comfort, that would be very different. Then their remaining at Scott would be inexcusable. Mrs. Flight and Mrs. Darling were women who were at variance on very many points of late, but openly in accord on this. Indeed, almost every woman at Scott had all of a sudden been seized by some strange lingual epidemic that manifested itself in the ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... view of the factory, he would shake his fist at it, and say, in a ferocious tone of voice, "Delenda est Carthago!" And certainly, I thought to myself, it must be admitted by every body, that the factory people are inexcusable in raising a rebellion against my brother. But still rebels were men, and sometimes were women; and rebels, that stretch out their petticoats like fans for the sake of screening one from the hot pursuit of enemies with fiery ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... was much more costly than at present the tendency naturally was to use just as little light as necessary. That attitude could not have been severely criticized in those early days of artificial lighting, but it is inexcusable to-day. Eyesight and greater safety from accidents are in themselves valuable enough to warrant adequate lighting, but besides these there is the appeal ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh
... right until Fergus, customer No. 2, sent in a mail order to the house. They, by mistake (and an inexcusable one— but what can you expect of underpaid stock boys?) shipped out to him some goods branded the same as those my first customer, Stack, had in his house. Fergus wrote in to me and told me about ...
— Tales of the Road • Charles N. Crewdson
... this time, the bull will be almost crying he will be so sore. This is the moment for the entrance of the intrepid matador. The matador will wear an outing cap with a cutaway and Jaeger vest, and the animal will become so infuriated by this inexcusable mesalliance of garments that he will charge madly at his antagonist. The matador, who will be equipped with boxing-gloves, will feint with his left and pull the daisy-hat down over the bull's eyes with his right, immediately afterward stepping quickly ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... relations in the army. Here it is as if each one had a personal enemy in the street below struggling to get up to him. When we are anxious we are pale; when we are glad we have tears in our eyes. This 'unnecessary' and 'inexcusable' war (as it has been called in England) represents the only hope of a nation agonising between death and life. You talk about our living or dying, but we live or die. That's the difference between ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... so much into detail I should have given further instances of Chiabrera's Epitaphs, but I must content myself with saying that if he had abstained from the introduction of heathen mythology, of which he is lavish—an inexcusable fault for an inhabitant of a Christian country, yet admitting of some palliation in an Italian who treads classic soil and has before his eyes the ruins of the temples which were dedicated to those fictitious beings of objects of worship by the majestic people his ancestors—had omitted ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... that an opportunity should present itself. (How simple all this reads! As I read it over it does not seem credible. Think of a man who has reached the height of his ambition, has dwelt there serenely, and then falls in this silly, inexcusable fashion! Well, that is human nature, the human part of it. Only here and there do ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... the ships sent to his assistance returned to Lord Grambier on the 13th. Lord Cochrane, seeing that it would be easy for him to do much further mischief, made ready for the work on the morrow. But from this he was prevented by the inexcusable conduct of Lord Gambier, who, having discountenanced the attempt with the fireships, now not only refused to take part in the victory which his comrade had made possible, but also hindered ...
— 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
... for, hitherto, has been immediately forthcoming. Now she is ill, and she naturally considers the doctors and nurses mere agents to secure her relief from discomfort. She is willing to pay any price for that—and still she is allowed to suffer. From her point of view it is utterly unreasonable, inexcusable. What are hospitals and nurses for, anyway? And she is carping, critical, and disagreeable. Her attitude is as sick as her body. How could it ...
— Applied Psychology for Nurses • Mary F. Porter
... sites. They are standing witnesses to the essentially criminal and senseless character of the Revolution of 1789. The Jacqueries which Arthur Young found raging all over France during that year of ill omen were not much less brutal and they were much more inexcusable than the Jacqueries of 1357 for which the Comte de Foix and the Captal de Buch exacted the stern vengeance chronicled by Froissart. They were the cause and not the consequence of that emigration of the landed classes which contributed so much to the downfall ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... up to the time of the election, and up to the time of this trial. The Federal troops were present at all times to preserve the peace and to protect life and property. There was no reason to anticipate any disturbance. Therefore this bold denial was an inexcusable and corrupt violation of the natural and inalienable rights of ...
— King Coal - A Novel • Upton Sinclair
... midst again he scarcely heard his father express his regrets that so painful a scene should have occurred under his roof, while the Arab said that he could quite understand why the daughter of Thomas should have been betrayed to anger: the massacre of Abyla was quite inexcusable. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... quality of Miss Owen's poetry it is scarce necessary to speak; be it sufficient to say that the present piece ranks among her best. In the intense fervour of the sentiment, and the felicitous choice of the imagery, the touch of the born poet is alike shown. Through an almost inexcusable editorial mistake of our own, the first word of this poem is erroneously rendered. Line 1 ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... great difference. He meant to pay it in time, but just now he was hard up. He had made the mistake of trying to be a society man, to compete with those whose incomes were many times as large as his own. In his heart he knew the purchase of that fan for Madelaine was a piece of inexcusable extravagance, but he had ...
— The Pleasant Street Partnership - A Neighborhood Story • Mary F. Leonard
... all considerations of individual right—in comparison with which races and nations are but sands upon the shore of Time. She little realized how grand a necessity lay at the back of that movement which seemed to her so heartless and inexcusable. She knew, of course, vaguely and weakly, that the Fathers made a Constitution on which our government was based. She did not quite understand its nature, which was very strange, since she had often heard it expounded, and as a matter of duty had ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... their behaviour is left at each house on the first of the year. All little failings, peccadilloes, and asperities are strictly fined. The inevitable result is that either the family behaviour improves, or the parish charities benefit. I'm starting its operation in my parish to-day. Forgive any inexcusable rudeness in leaving the first box with you. I must hurry ...
— Dolly Reforming Herself - A Comedy in Four Acts • Henry Arthur Jones
... guards, and to sit before him is always interdicted. Let none, when the king is engaged in doing anything (in respect of his servants) come forward pressing himself zealously before others, for even if the aggrieved be very poor, such conduct would still be inexcusable.[7] It behoveth no man to reveal to others any lie the king may have told inasmuch as the king bears ill will to those that report his falsehoods. Kings also always disregard persons that regard themselves as learned. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... excellent brothers, Bartholomew and Diego, Columbus took the most energetic steps for the benefit of the colony. A turbulent spirit existed among the settlers, and many of the natives had been driven into hostility. By an inexcusable stratagem of Ojeda, one of the most powerful caciques, Caonabo was captured. Several others were afterwards taken prisoners. The Spaniards, however, quarrelled among themselves, and neglecting the excellent regulations of Columbus, set his authority at defiance, ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... of the most inexcusable deeds with which Rationalism stands charged. We refer to the general destruction or alteration of the time-honored ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... merely sentimental affection which ignores the reality of evil or explains away the wrongfulness of wrong. In order to love his enemies it is not necessary for a Christian to pretend that they are not really hostile, to make excuses for things that are inexcusable, or to be blind to the moral issues which may be at stake. It has rightly been pointed out that "Love your enemies" means "Want them to be your friends: want them to alter, so that friendship between you and them may become possible." More generally ...
— Religious Reality • A.E.J. Rawlinson
... night and you waited an hour? In the name—Well, we must by crazy! We've been talking for the last thirty minutes about our engagement with you, and I wasn't sure of the hour. What's that? I don't wonder you're mad. It is inexcusable, but it was my fault. I'm entirely to blame, and Miss Cary will be distressed to death to hear of our bad behavior. You know how particular she is about things of this kind and never breaks an engagement. You are going to forgive ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher
... thinking—as he certainly had thought, and even had expressed on more than one occasion in writing—that in permitting her European movements to be shaped in accordance with her daughter's fancies she had exhibited an inexcusable weakness. ...
— The Uncle Of An Angel - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... died at Suchow, the frontier city of China, but not before he had ascertained that China and Cathay were the same. After the publication of the narrative of his journey (in the Expeditio Christiana apud Sinas of Trigault, 1615) inexcusable ignorance alone could continue to distinguish between them, but such ignorance lingered many ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... unfortunate; an utterly inexcusable laughter seemed to bewitch them, hovering always close to his ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... idle, let them take care of themselves, let them think of their health—and they die! The rust rots the steel which use preserves; and, thank Heaven, although Gertrude, once during our voyage, seemed roused, by an inexcusable imprudence of emotion on my part, into some suspicion of her state, yet it passed away; for she thinks rarely of herself,—I am ever in her thoughts and seldom from her side, and you know, too, the sanguine and credulous nature of her disease. But, indeed, I now hope more than I ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... quern, the myth assumes a whimsical shape. The prose Edda tells of a primeval age of gold, when everybody had whatever he wanted. This was because the giant Frodi had a mill which ground out peace and plenty and abundance of gold withal, so that it lay about the roads like pebbles. Through the inexcusable avarice of Frodi, this wonderful implement was lost to the world. For he kept his maid-servants working at the mill until they got out of patience, and began to make it grind out hatred and war. Then came a mighty sea-rover by night and slew ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske
... even in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, an English nobleman[13] encouraged the belief of his descent from a swan, and was complimented in a dedication upon his feathered pedigree, a similar infatuation may be the less inexcusable in Kien-Long, a monarch, the length and happiness of whose reign, the unlimited obedience of whose incalculable number of subjects, and the health and vigour of whose body, have hitherto kept out of his view most of those circumstances that ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... April 6, 1815, matters reached a crisis. The soldiers, losing all presence of mind, fired on the defenceless Americans, killing five men and wounding thirty-four. Thus the last blood shed in the War of 1812 was the blood of unarmed prisoners. But the massacre, horrible and inexcusable as it was, had the effect of hastening the release of the survivors; and soon the last of the captives was on his way home to the country over which peace at ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... I BEG your pardon," he stammered over and over again. "I quite forgot. It was inexcusable of me. I'm ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... before the committee had any preparation made, or was, in fact, appointed. The old committee had emphatically protested against the dismissal, and published a resolution condemnatory of it, as an inexcusable cruelty. Although twenty per cent. of the labouring population were turned adrift in that locality, not one supernumerary was disemployed. No pay-clerk lost his salary, though his labour was diminished by one-fifth; no check-clerk was dismissed, though there were twenty per cent. ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke
... Randal resolved on advising her to write to her husband by the messenger; explaining that she was not to blame for the inexcusable delay which had already taken place. Without a word more to Mrs. Presty, he hastened out of the room. That inveterately distrustful woman called him back. She desired to know where he was going, and why he was ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... to comply with her request. He said, 'It would be inexcusable, even in a man, to run such a risk—I don't believe there is another woman in England who would think of such a thing.' ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... be concealed from my sister. They heightened her solicitude to be acquainted with the cause. There were many reasons persuading me to silence; at least, till I had seen my brother, it would be an act of inexcusable temerity to unfold what had lately passed. No other expedient for eluding her importunities occurred to me but that of returning to my own house. I recollected my determination to become a tenant of this roof. I mentioned it ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... evil has come with the good, and much fine gold has been corroded. With riches has come inexcusable waste. We have squandered a great part of what we might have used, and have not stopped to conserve the exceeding bounty of nature, without which our genius for enterprise would have been worthless and impotent, scorning to be careful, shamefully prodigal as well as admirably efficient. ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson
... the contingency which made John Tyler president of the United States. Why he was ever named on the electoral ticket is itself inexplicable. He distinguished himself only by virtue of his mistakes, from first to last inexcusable; and the biography, by the son, is distinguished only by innuendos and a current of bitterness which destroy its value as historical authority. This is much to be regretted; because an unprejudiced life of John Tyler has ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 4 • Various
... full confession and outpouring of his troubles. It cost him much, for there was shame at his own folly and selfishness, and he had to disclose extravagance that he well knew to be, in John's eyes, especially inexcusable. So painful was the effort, that even his fears for his family would not alone have determined him on making it, if it had not been for his new resolution to face the worst, and to have no more shufflings or ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... while I read these details, I continued rather to sympathise with Mr. Huddlestone than with his victims; so complete already was the empire of my love for my wife. A price was naturally set upon the banker's head; and, as the case was inexcusable and the public indignation thoroughly aroused, the unusual figure of L750 was offered for his capture. He was reported to have large sums of money in his possession. One day he had been heard of in Spain; the next, there was sure intelligence that he was still ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... plays are well known. From the peculiar circumstances attending their performance they call for a share of particular attention, which would otherwise be superfluous. Where there is something new, and much to be admired, it would be inexcusable to be niggard of our labour, even were the labour painful, which in this instance it is not. The performance of Master Payne pleased us so much that we have often since derived great enjoyment from the ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold
... The ship's speed being thus checked, the boat came alongside, and the party scrambled on board. Singularly enough, the enemy, disconcerted by Nelson's action, stopped also, to allow his consort to come up,—a measure wholly inexcusable, and only to be accounted for by that singular moral effect produced in many men by a sudden and unexpected occurrence. The daring deed had therefore the happiest results of a stratagem, and the frigate was ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... pungent smell. She sniffed, and then her heart suddenly sank as she realized that the cereal was burning. She recognized a peculiarly disagreeable flavor about which she had often scolded the cook, thinking such carelessness on the part of one of her employees to be absolutely inexcusable. ...
— Ladies Must Live • Alice Duer Miller
... getting well started on the subject of Sally Carrol's eyes and, how they had allured him ever since she entered the room, went into a violent convulsion when he found she was visiting the Bellamys—was Harry's fiancee. He seemed to feel as though he had made some risque and inexcusable blunder, became immediately formal and left her ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... Alfonso de Hinojosa, from resentment against Gonzalo for superseding him in the government, had sent privately to offer his assistance to Centeno. Both of these reports are highly probable; as otherwise it would have been a most inexcusable rashness in Centeno, to call it no worse, to have presumed upon attacking Cuzco with the small number of men he had collected; as, besides the inhabitants of the city, there were more than five hundred ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... packet arrived this morning. I have not yet had leisure to read all my letters, but as an express is ready to go early tomorrow, I rather choose to rely upon your goodness to excuse a letter written in extreme haste, than to hold myself inexcusable, by not informing you of what we yet know of the state of our negotiations. None of my letters is of a later date than the 25th of December. All difficulties had then been removed with respect to us, and the preliminaries were signed; they consist ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various
... severely. "This is inexcusable! If you had explained to me in the first place, the jury would never have ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster
... calls which I used to receive at that time from Sir Andrew Buchanan, the English ambassador, and Talleyrand, the French representative, who tried to frighten me out of my wits by attacking the Prussian policy for its inexcusable adherence to Russia, and who used rather a threatening language with me. At noon of the same days I then used to have the pleasure of listening in the Prussian diet to somewhat the same arguments and attacks which the foreign ambassadors had made upon me in the morning. I suffered it quietly, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... which he could no longer resist, his dispositions seem to have been made with his usual skill. Where he failed, however, was where, from all his previous history, we should least have expected failure, in his abandonment of the attack on the Galleon of Venice; this, of course, was inexcusable, and can only be set down to failure of nerve at the supreme moment. The ship had been battered by artillery all day long, a huge percentage of her company were dead and wounded, and the remainder worn out with fatigue. On the Moslem side we have seen that there were squadrons of galleys able to ...
— Sea-Wolves of the Mediterranean • E. Hamilton Currey
... acknowledgment rendered me utterly inexcusable; that it was no uncommon case to meet sinners who allowed themselves to be so dazzled with the glare of vice as to prefer it openly to the true splendour of virtue; they were at least deluded by the false image ...
— Manon Lescaut • Abbe Prevost
... father, that might be a reason why, notwithstanding the splendour of his prospects, he should not be admitted to further intimacy at the villa. To borrow money from one's tradesman was, in the eyes of Sir Thomas, about as inexcusable an offence as a young man could commit. He was too much disturbed in mind to go home on the following day, but on the Thursday he returned to the villa. The following Sunday would be ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... garments for certain forms of animal life, which he carefully deposited in a little silver box carried for this special purpose. Nevertheless it must be admitted that there have been from time to time cases of brutality towards natives sufficiently gross and inexcusable to create a very deplorable impression. I have met educated Indians who, though they have had no unpleasant experiences of the kind themselves, prefer to avoid entering a railway carriage occupied by Europeans lest they should ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... disloyal citizens of the United States to involve us in foreign wars to aid an inexcusable insurrection have been unavailing. Her Britannic Majesty's Government, as was justly expected, have exercised their authority to prevent the departure of new hostile expeditions from British ports. The Emperor ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... better left alone, from the village point of view. It was bad enough to occupy so much time when already it was darkening and soon the lamps would have to be lighted; it was bad enough to pray in public for the rector and his wife; it was entirely inexcusable to hint at the presence of a sinner in their midst, at the very board now covered with the home-made dainties cooked and sent in by the ladies of Hawthorne. In itself perhaps the prayer, though trite and redundant (Ringfield was not in his best vein, ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison
... with nervousness, striving to penetrate the mental processes of this handsome Mrs. Hallam. She seemed to regard him with a suspicion which he thought inexcusable. Did she suppose he had spirited Dorothy Calendar away and then called to apprise her of the fact? Or that he was some sort of an adventurer, who had manufactured a plausible yarn to gain him access to her home? Or—harking back to her original theory—that he was an emissary from Scotland ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... expression of her lips; she was like a counterfeit beside a good coin. It was easy to conceive how others might be deceived by her tricks of resemblance—servants, ordinary friends, even the old lawyer in charge of the estate—but it was inexcusable for him to have thus become a plaything. Yet he had, and now the mistake was too late to mend. He had left Natalie alone on the cliff, and then blindly permitted this chit to lead him straight into Hobart's set trap. Angered beyond control at the memory, ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... contrary to all history to arrest the tide of war at this stage. The antagonism is too direct, and the conflict too heated to quench the flame till rivers of blood shall pass over it. The act of the South in firing on Sumter is none other than a rebellion, and that of the most inexcusable and wicked character, against the best government on earth; and I am free to confess that I am filled with horror when I contemplate the result of this suicidal act on their part, an act that must lead to years of war, as ...
— Thirty Years in the Itinerancy • Wesson Gage Miller
... and sensitive condition of Illinois politics this ungracious outside interference may be said to have insured Lincoln's defeat. While it gave him pain to be thus wounded in the house of his friends, he yet more deeply deplored the inexcusable blunder of leaders whose misplaced sympathy put in jeopardy the success of a vital political principle. In his convention speech he had forcibly stated the error and danger of such a step. "How can he [Douglas] ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... for reasons which we may call personal at second-hand, because the one was a friend of his sister-in-law and the other an enemy of his father. As for Dickens' caricature of "Sir John Chester" in Barnaby Rudge it is not so much a caricature as a sheer and inexcusable libel. Anyhow, the letters of the Earl and the Lady are exceedingly good reading. Persons of no advanced years who have been introduced to them in the twentieth century have been known to find them positively ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... exaggerated in calling him "a barbarian who could not write a sentence of grammar and could hardly spell his own name." He was never popular in the federalist section of the Union. Yet with all his mistakes and self-will, often inexcusable, he was one of the most patriotic and clear-headed men who ever administered a government. If he resorted to unheard-of methods within the law, very careful was he never to transgress ...
— History of the United States, Volume 3 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... wrung his hand and Sylvia kissed him penitently. "Where have you been? I came home to lunch, and made several appointments to introduce Austin to some very influential men, who I think would make valuable acquaintances for him. It's inexcusable, Sylvia, for you to ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes
... of being an inexcusable recreant where duty was concerned; she was understanding in better fashion the men and the manners of the north country and she realized the full force of the reasons for his flight and why the situation had overwhelmed him. Her pity and remorse had ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day
... express my most profound regret, sir," he said, "on behalf, of the force. Such a mistake is inexcusable. Mr. Cullen will, I am sure, join ...
— An Amiable Charlatan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Kedsty. "As you have described it, the crime was deliberate—horrible and inexcusable to its last detail. You were not moved by a sudden passion. You tortured ...
— The Valley of Silent Men • James Oliver Curwood
... that cool thoughtlessness of danger, which so often distinguishes our British tars, was displayed in such a striking manner, that it would be inexcusable to omit it. Daniel Monro, had, as we have already seen, gained the fore-top. He suddenly disappeared, and it was concluded that he had been washed away like many others. After being absent from the top about two hours, he, to ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... and to use language that was personally offensive. He told the Legislature in one veto message that "of all the defective and shabby legislation which has been presented to me, this is the worst and most inexcusable." He once sent a scolding message to the State Senate, in which he said that "the money of the State is apparently expended with no regard to economy," and that "barefaced jobbery has been permitted." The Senate having refused ...
— The Cleveland Era - A Chronicle of the New Order in Politics, Volume 44 in The - Chronicles of America Series • Henry Jones Ford
... inclined to judge the past career of humanity anachronistically. All the things that had been done or thought which could not be justified in the new age of enlightenment, were regarded as gratuitous and inexcusable errors. The traditions, superstitions, and customs, the whole "code of fraud and woe" transmitted from the past, weighed then too heavily in France to allow the school of reform to do impartial justice to their origins. They felt a sort of resentment against history. ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury
... I will do the best that I can," he said, smiling, "and you must pardon my blunders. First, Mr. Lester, on behalf of Armand et Fils, I must ask your pardon for this mistake, so inexcusable." ...
— The Mystery Of The Boule Cabinet - A Detective Story • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... minute I thought you had been guilty of an inexcusable act but upon second thought I begin to understand that it is impossible. There is ...
— The Circus Boys On the Mississippi • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... simply inexcusable, and stands out a foul blot on the memory of every Rebel in high place ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... against you, which is worse. You are something for people to laugh at. You are also expected to laugh. It is all right for a thin man to be grouchy; people will say the poor creature has dyspepsia and should be humored along. But a fat man with a grouch is inexcusable in any company—there is so much of him to be grouchy. He constitutes a wave of discontent and a period of general depression. He is not expected to be romantic and sentimental either. It is all right for a giraffe to be sentimental, but not a hippopotamus. ...
— Cobb's Anatomy • Irvin S. Cobb
... institutions are kind-hearted and humane, and are endeavoring to do the best they can, with the means at their disposal. After saying that, I propose, without any regard as to whom it may please or displease, to point out candidly what seems to me inexcusable thoughtlessness and grievous errors in the treatment of the ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks
... made him miserable. Thus man, intended by Nature for the full enjoyment of liberty, to patiently search out her laws, to investigate her secrets, to cling to his experience; has, from a neglect of her salutary admonitions, from an inexcusable ignorance of his own peculiar essence, fallen into servility: has been ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach
... being not devoid of ambition, soon began to look upon his position as the starting-point for a greater prize. Lady Eynesford was, here again, with him—up to a point. She thought (and thoughts are apt to put themselves with a bluntness which would be inexcusable in speech) that it was high time that Eleanor Scaife was married, and, from an abstract point of view, this could hardly be denied. Lady Eynesford took the next step. Eleanor and Coxon would suit one another to perfection. Hence the invitations to tea, and ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... him possible, for it makes the saliencies of his character jut out within a close compass. It can be read in a couple of hours, and no reading of the same length in any of his complete writings would give such a notion of the most witty, perverse, tender, savage, pitiable and inexcusable of men. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various
... "Negroes were heathen," and, therefore, not entitled to the privileges of Christian freemen? It was not the act of that government, which in its conscious rectitude "can put ten thousand to flight," but was rather the inexcusable feebleness of a diseased conscience, that staggers off for refuge "when ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams
... in a venerable house; and such a thing as a profusion of flowers in her rooms was unattainable to her. Sometimes in the spring she had bought six tulips at Shoolbred's, unable to resist them, conscious that Mellersh if he knew what they had cost would think it inexcusable; but they had soon died, and then there were no more. As for the Judas tree, she hadn't an idea what it was, and gazed at it out there against the sky with the rapt expression of one who ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim
... strange rendering "of the conditions and fate of the land" rests upon an erroneous reading (see the corrections, Appendix I), which is the more inexcusable because in line 97 the same ideogram, Ks sikaru, "wine," occurs, and is correctly rendered by him. Simti mti is not the "fate of the land," but the "fixed ...
— An Old Babylonian Version of the Gilgamesh Epic • Anonymous
... his reputation and prospects was no promising son-in-law, opposed the marriage, forced Jean to give up the paper, and sent her off to another town. Burns chose to regard Jean's submission to her father as inexcusable faithlessness, and proceeded to indulge in the ecstatic misery of the lover betrayed. There is no doubt that he suffered keenly from the affair: he writes to his friends that he could "have no nearer idea of the place of eternal punishment" than what he had felt ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... inexcusable if I had forgotten you," he answered with a smile. "Still, I couldn't quite place you until a few moments ago, when you faced the light. But you were wrong in one thing; I'm ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... out who is responsible for the long delay in discovering the Waern claim, Lander. That is inexcusable." ...
— The Best Made Plans • Everett B. Cole
... married woman it is an inexcusable crime when she wanders from the path of honor; still, there are degrees even in such a case. Some women, far from being depraved, conceal their fall and remain to all appearances quite respectable, like those two just referred to, while others add to their fault the disgrace of speculation. ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... me that I was not making the story very clear to him; I couldn't, because any complete explanation would have reached back too far into my past. The half-confidence was inexcusable, and I was aware of this. I owed this man, whose daughter I wished to marry, the fullest and frankest statement of all the facts. But I didn't give ...
— Branded • Francis Lynde
... own case, the Board of Registers were kind enough to send me a special request to the effect that they wished me not to fail to register as a life voter. I do not wish to convey the impression that all worthy colored people have been registered in Alabama, because there have been many inexcusable and unlawful omissions; but, with few exceptions, the 2700 who have been registered represent the best Negroes in ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... brays is wiser than the man who asks what can't be answered," he said, under his breath. "For the love of Heaven, quit it! Why-ing in a man is as inexcusable as whining in a woman. There's my ...
— How It Happened • Kate Langley Bosher
... document are the more inexcusable because their author ignored local names recognized in the earlier publications of the government and its agents. In such matters, too, the safe principle is to follow local custom where that is logical and established. The new map ...
— The Mountain that was 'God' • John H. Williams
... asked Marjorie, forgetting other interests. She turned to Francis, forgetting their feud again, in a common and inexcusable curiosity. "Francis! Now we'll know what it really was that ailed him—the nervous spells, you know? I always told you ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer
... profound error. It is an inexcusable error. The daily papers are constantly reporting cases of the lapse and restoration of memory that contain all the elements of underlying ...
— The Trained Memory • Warren Hilton
... others the mangle guard was insufficient. In all the hospitals I heard of casualties. Fingers had been mashed. A hand had been mashed. An arm had been dragged out. Unguarded machinery was, of course, a striking inconsistency, more inexcusable in the hospitals than in hotels or in commercial laundries. For hospitals are not engaged in a gainful pursuit, regardless of all humanitarian considerations. On the contrary, they are not only avowedly ...
— Making Both Ends Meet • Sue Ainslie Clark and Edith Wyatt
... questioned as to the cause of such a breach of the peace of the Academy, all the seventeen Crows attempted to explain the high-handed and inexcusable conduct of the wicked Dozen which had picked on eighteen defenseless men and made them prisoners. The instructor had been a boy himself once, and he could not entirely conceal a little smile at the thought of the cruelty of the Lakerim Twelve. Just then MacManus ...
— The Dozen from Lakerim • Rupert Hughes
... policeman to carry out the judge's orders. In consequence, as yet each nation must depend upon itself for its own protection. The frightful calamities that have befallen China, solely because she has had no power of self-defense, ought to make it inexcusable in any wise American citizen to pretend to patriotic purpose, and yet to fail to insist that the United States shall keep in a condition of ability if necessary to assert its rights with a strong hand. It is folly of the criminal ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... possessed him. Not at Matheson, but at himself. He ought to have guessed before. This was the one possibility he had completely overlooked. Matheson had tricked him by shamming death. He ought not to have let himself be tricked. That was inexcusable. ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... still to remember about the "Ave Maris Stella" it would be inexcusable of me to forget it. My first manuscript having gone astray I spent the whole of yesterday in rewriting this very simple song, of which you will receive two versions at once by the next possible occasion; one for mezzosoprano voice with Piano or Harmonium ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... sounded a trifle odd—the effect of which was that Chad broke into a laugh. Strether, at this, succumbed as well, though with extreme brevity. "Permit us to have still our theory. But if you ARE so free and so strong you're inexcusable. I'll write in the morning," he added with decision. "I'll say ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... France, neither a set-to, nor an action for assault, would repay the generality of any class removed from the poverty of the bas peuple, for so great and inexcusable an affront. In all countries it is the feelings of the generality of people, that courtesy, which is the essence of honour, obliges one to consult. As in England I should, therefore, have paid, so ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... inexcusable Gisquet order, which enjoined doctors to lodge information against the wounded, having outraged public opinion, and not opinion alone, but the King first of all, the wounded were covered and protected by this indignation; and, with the exception of those who had been made prisoners in the very ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... of indexes and tables of contents; it is scarcely possible, except by looking over the whole, to find any passage you want. This is a fault which, in a person of his accurate and scientific mind, is very surprising, and the more inexcusable that it could so easily be remedied by mechanical industry, or the aid of compilers and index-makers. But akin to this, is another fault of a more irremediable kind, as it originates in the varied excellences ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... of aspiring writers to locate their stories in England, to speak proudly but uncertainly of grand estates, noble castles, and haughty lords and ladies, and to make mistakes which would be ridiculous were they not so inexcusable. There is a certain half-feudal glamour about England yet which appeals strongly to the callow author: it lends that rosy haze of romance and unreality which is popularly associated with fiction; but it was ...
— Short Story Writing - A Practical Treatise on the Art of The Short Story • Charles Raymond Barrett
... what could be done for him, and finding the prison in charge of a gentleman who was under much obligation to me, gained admittance without much difficulty. It was a wretched place, and the prisoners were but poorly fed; which was far more inexcusable here than at the South, where food was scarce in their own army ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... kind of middle ground between Calvinists and Arminians. They reject the doctrine of eternal reprobation, and hold the universality of redemption, and that the Spirit of God operates on the world, or as coextensively as Christ has made the atonement, in such a manner as to leave all men inexcusable. ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... in front of the house awakened her from her meditation. Madame Foucault and a man very much younger than Madame Foucault got out of it. Sophia fled. After all, this prying into other people's rooms was quite inexcusable. She dropped on to her own bed and picked up a book, in case Madame ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... for nothing—all the past was one long fraud, one stupendous, hideous lie; and this man, who throughout his whole life had made a practice of dissimulation and duplicity, was now incensed at the deception of another, was as indignant at it as at some unpardonable backsliding, some inexcusable and inexplicable perfidy. He was quite unable to understand how Elena could have committed such a crime; he denied her all possibility of justification, and rejected the hypothesis of some secret and dire necessity having driven her to sudden flight. He could see nothing but the bare brutal ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... towards the goal of their catastrophe. If then any slight inaccuracy as to dates arrests your critical ken, believe that it is not ignorantly careless, but learnedly needful. One other objection, and I have done. No man is an utter inexcusable, irremediable villain; there is a spot of light, however hidden, somewhere; and, notwithstanding the historian's picture, it may charitably be doubted whether we have made due allowance for his most reasonable prejudice even in Nero's case. Human nature has ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... character. Though he had a good living—at least, what the laity in speaking of clerical incomes is generally inclined to call a good living, we will say amounting in value to four hundred pounds a-year—he was always in debt. This was the more inexcusable as he had no children, and had ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... too, that while she had so freely opened the door to him, and had admitted him with a confidence wholly inexcusable, he had in no way returned that confidence. She searched her memory for some word—some expression of his, that would even hint at what he thought, or believed, or was, within himself; something that would justify her in feeling that she knew ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright
... which those Standards could not be broken up into two, if not three, independent classes, if the children, whose ages range as a rule between eleven and fourteen, could be trusted to work by themselves. In many cases this over-grouping is wholly inexcusable, the headmaster having no class of his own to teach, and being therefore free to do what obviously ought to be done,—to separate the older and more advanced children from the rest of the top class, and form them into a separate class (a real top class) for independent study and self-education under ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes
... continues, though, to be absolutely just, the later parts are not exposed to quite the same objections as the earlier. These objections transform themselves, however, into other varieties, and are reinforced by fresh faults. The most inexcusable digressions, on subjects as remote from each other as convents and sewers, insist on poking themselves in. The central, or what ought to be the central, interest itself turns on the ridiculous emeute of Saint-Merry, a thing "without a purpose ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... Council of Pennsylvania, not only brought charge against him of abusing his position for his own advantage, but also laid the charges before each State government. In the end Arnold was tried by court-martial and after long and inexcusable delay, on January 26, 1780, he was acquitted of everything but the imprudence of using, in an emergency, public wagons to remove private property, and of granting irregularly a pass to a ship to enter the port of Philadelphia. Yet ...
— Washington and his Comrades in Arms - A Chronicle of the War of Independence • George Wrong
... meet you, Deborah, after my inexcusable neglect," he said, "and first of all I ask you to forgive me. It scarcely seems possible to myself that I should ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer
... said, "I may make mistakes. In fact, it was with much reluctance I promised to come, and if Bob hadn't insisted——" He paused and pulled himself together. "On the surface, of course, his conduct looks inexcusable, but he really has some defense, and I think you ought to hear ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... which would have been humiliating to his pride, but certainly was deserved at his hands. Under the domination of his masterful pride, which was both the strength and the weakness of Graham's character, making him capable of the most absolute loyalty, and capable of the most inexcusable deeds, a pride no friend could guide, and no adversity could break, Claverhouse fell into a fit of silent anger with himself, with MacKay, with his absent critics, with the Prince. It was also in keeping with his nature to be that afternoon gayer than usual—recalling the humorous ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... voyage, and then to be suddenly and unexpectedly prohibited from landing—this is so maddening to the temper, that no one who had ever experienced the trial would say that even the most violent impatience of such restraint is wholly inexcusable. I am not going to pretend, however, that the course which we chose to adopt on the occasion can be perfectly justified. The impropriety of a traveller’s setting at naught the regulations of a foreign State is clear enough, and the bad taste of compassing such ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake
... avoided marching through Plassans if its leaders had not decided that a little food and a few hours' rest were absolutely necessary for the men. Instead of pushing forward direct to the chief town of the department, the column, owing to the inexcusable weakness and the inexperience of the improvised general who commanded it, was now diverging to the left, making a detour which was destined, ultimately, to lead it to destruction. It was bound for the heights of Sainte-Roure, still about ten leagues distant, and it was in view of this long march ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola |
