"Infirm" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... absence, and that a very old friend had arrived almost directly we left on Monday, and had departed early this morning to climb Adam's Peak, the ascent of which is a long and tedious affair, but it cannot be difficult, as thousands of aged and infirm pilgrims go every year to worship at the Buddhist or Mohammedan temples at the summit. The giant footprint has been reverenced alike by both religions from the earliest ages. Its existence is differently ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... at the quarter visiting the sick, the aged and infirm, seeing that their wants were supplied, reading the Bible to them, praying with them, telling of the better land where no trouble or sorrow can come, and trying to make the way to it, through the shed blood ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... Government with a voluminous philosophical dissertation on the subject, whilst the Filipinos sought brief facts and tangible conditions. The Filipinos then offered to address a note to the Spanish Consul in Manila to the effect that the prisoners who were infirm would be delivered at certain ports as already stated, and that he could send ships for them on certain terms. Still the commissioners lingered in Tarlac, and on October 23 the Filipinos made the following proposals, which were practically ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... persons who are defective in moral sensibility, just as other persons are wanting in an ear for music. But for the honest, vacillating minds, the tender consciences supported by the tremulous knees of an infirm intelligence, the timid compromisers who are always trying to curve the straight lines and round the sharp angles of eternal law, the continual debate of these living questions is the one offered means of grace and hope of earthly redemption. And thus a ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... of the nobles of Hungary and Bohemia to meet him at Znaim in Moravia, near the frontiers of Austria, and sent for Albert and his daughter to hasten to that place. The infirm emperor, traveling by slow stages, succeeded in reaching Znaim. He immediately summoned the nobles to his presence, and introducing to them Albert and Elizabeth, thus affectingly ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... Babylon; and they discoursed in their sermons of Moses sending forth Joshua against Amalek. Abercromby, raised to his place by political influence, was little but the nominal commander. "A heavy man," said Wolfe in a letter to his father; "an aged gentleman, infirm in body and mind," wrote William Parkman, a boy of seventeen, who carried a musket in a Massachusetts regiment, and kept in his knapsack a dingy little notebook, in which he jotted down what passed each day.[607] The age of ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... Brunswick, who was dangerously wounded at the battle of Auerstadt, arrived on the 29th of October at Altona.—[This Prince was in the seventy-second year of his age, and extremely infirm.]—His entrance into that city afforded a striking example of the vicissitudes of fortune. That Prince entered Altona on a wretched litter, borne by ten men, without officers, without domestics, followed by a troop of vagabonds and children, who were drawn together ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... undoubtedly believed would be tendered him by the Southern Whigs, seconded by many Southern Democrats. He lost flesh, the color faded from his cheeks, the lids of his dark eyes were livid, and he was evidently debilitated and infirm. At times he would be apparently unconscious of those around him, then he would rally, and would display his wonderful conversational qualities. Yet it was evident to those who knew him best that he was "stumbling down," as Carlyle said of Mirabeau, "like a mighty ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... government,—all these have darkened in no common measure the conditions from which Italian national life has to be built up. If in spite of overwhelming difficulties each crisis has hitherto been surmounted; if, with all that is faulty and infirm, the omens for the future of Italy are still favourable, one source of its good fortune has been the impress given to its ecclesiastical policy by the great statesman to whom above all other men it owes the accomplishment ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... things upon it. But it brings in holiness of heart where the text speaks only of acceptance of person, and it mingles the two topics so ingeniously together that the impression is seriously complicated. Think of the pious daughter yonder in church, going home to her infirm old mother, and trying to answer the question, "What did the gentleman preach about to-night?" Let us do our best to preach sermons which are not only ...
— To My Younger Brethren - Chapters on Pastoral Life and Work • Handley C. G. Moule
... laws must be all-controlling. They do nothing but compel and drive. They exhibit no mercy, but perpetual reproach, censure, condemnation, blame and bluster. They can endure no imperfection. But among Christians many are sinners, many infirm. In fact, Christians associate only with these; not with saints. Christians reject none, but bear with all. Indeed, they are as sincerely interested for sinners as they would be for themselves were they the infirm. They pray for the sinners, teach, admonish, persuade, do all in their power to reclaim. ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther
... Heaven, was I not cursed More than enough, when thou didst fashion me To be a type of ugliness,—a thing By whose comparison all Rimini Holds itself beautiful? Lo! here I stand, A gnarled, blighted trunk! There's not a knave So spindle-shanked, so wry-faced, so infirm, Who looks at me, and smiles not on himself. And I have friends to pity me—great Heaven! One has a favourite leg that he bewails,— Another sees my hip with doleful plaints,— A third is sorry o'er my huge swart arms,— A fourth aspires to mount my very hump, And thence ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker
... rigor! Why shun, as worthless of affiliation, What men of all political persuasion Extol—and even use upon occasion— That Christian principle, conciliation? But possibly the men who make such fuss With Sunday pippins and old Trots infirm, Attach some other meaning to ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... ancient philosophy, and when I saw that the old philosopher had advertised his lectures or lecture on mythology, I could not resist, and went to Berlin in 1844. I must say at once that Professor Bopp, though he was extremely kind to me, was at that time, if not old—he was only fifty-three—very infirm. In his lectures he simply read his Comparative Grammar with a magnifying glass, and added very little that was new. He lent me some manuscripts which he had copied in Latin in his younger days, but I could not get much help from him when I came to really difficult passages. This, I confess, ...
— My Autobiography - A Fragment • F. Max Mueller
... stands for laws, for manners, for virtue, with this advantage, that no one is tempted to disobey her sweet and gentle voice: it is this pity which will always hinder a robust savage from plundering a feeble child, or infirm old man, of the subsistence they have acquired with pain and difficulty, if he has but the least prospect of providing for himself by any other means: it is this pity which, instead of that sublime maxim of argumentative ...
— A Discourse Upon The Origin And The Foundation Of - The Inequality Among Mankind • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... now for two months and they had done him no harm. They worked quietly, minded their cattle so that they should not stray, and even their children were not troublesome, but went to school at Hamer's house, where the infirm schoolmaster ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... of the former regime, the Count Solaro Margherita, who, during the long years under the reign of Charles Albert, had held the helm of the state, and was completely in bondage to the Jesuits. Though infirm in body, he betook himself to the presence of the successor of his ancient master, and falling on his knees, said to him, "Sire, do not refuse one of the most faithful servants of your dynasty the last favour ...
— The Vaudois of Piedmont - A Visit to their Valleys • John Napper Worsfold
... lay, still, in that same pose, without a stir, sick and dry-mouthed, infirm and languishing, with dying ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... the letter back in the envelope, and the envelope in his pocket. "She knows," he repeated. What under heaven had Dorothea been telling her? He must see Dorothea and have it stopped. Did she think him a feeble and infirm person who leaned on a stick, or a crabbed and cross one who had no manners? He would have to call, if only to thank her for her note. No. He would do that in writing. Next week, perhaps, he might drop in and see Dorothea. ...
— The Man in Lonely Land • Kate Langley Bosher
... Warriors, infirm with battles grown, Were there, in languid grandeur thrown On the low bench, who seem'd to say, "Our mortal vigour wanes away;" And gentle maid, with aspect meek, While cloud-like blushes cross ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham
... very fond of me, and in spite of the fact that I had been robbed of my rightful heritage, he was proud that he had a Pennington for a grandson. Thus I am sure that it was his will that I should have the Barton for my own. But during the last few years he had been very feeble and infirm, and thus in the hands of a clever lawyer he could easily be deceived as to ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... the Industrial Orphan Asylum intended that the institution should harbor, bring up, and instruct as great a number as possible of the children of infirm or deceased laborers. ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa
... night, May 5th, 1840, Lord William Russell, infirm, deaf, and aged, being in his seventy-third year, was murdered in his bed. He was a widower, living at No. 14 Norfolk Street, Park Lane, London, a small house, occupied by only himself and three servants,—Courvoisier, ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood
... place. The only demand they made upon us was enough money annually to get a new "critter," that is, a mule. With a certain lack of ingenuity the mule was reported each Christmas as having passed away, or at least as having become so infirm as to necessitate a successor—a solemn fiction which neither deceived nor was intended to deceive, but which furnished a gauge for the ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... broker was paid out. The Captain himself was punctual in his attendance at a church in his own neighbourhood, which hoisted the Union Jack every Sunday morning; and where he was good enough—the lawful beadle being infirm—to keep an eye upon the boys, over whom he exercised great power, in virtue of his mysterious hook. Knowing the regularity of the Captain's habits, Walter made all the haste he could, that he might anticipate ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... adjoining mine; I do not doubt but that she will place it at your disposal. You can at first send for Louise; then, if it must be, for Morel, that his daughter may bid him farewell. You will at least spare a poor, sick, and infirm ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... is Bligh's character of Judge Atkins—"He has been accustomed to inebriety—he has been the ridicule of the community, sentence of death has been pronounced in moments of intoxication, his determination is weak, his opinions floating and infirm, his knowledge of the law insignificant and subject to private inclination; and confidential cases of the crown, where due secresy is required, he is not to be trusted with." (Letter to Secretary of State.) Yet Atkins was ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... more amusing and pleasing contrast between two great men than between Wilberforce and Chalmers. Chalmers is stout and erect, with a broad countenance—Wilberforce minute, and singularly twisted: Chalmers, both in body and mind, moves with, a deliberate step—Wilberforce, infirm as he is in his advanced years, flies about with astonishing activity, and while, with nimble finger, he seizes on every thing that adorns or diversifies his path, his mind flits from object to object with unceasing ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... should be taken as fact by all the village, and a curious part of her character was that she never sought to ask Helmsley privately, for her own enlightenment, anything of his history. She seemed content to accept him as an old and infirm man, who must be taken care of simply because he was old and infirm, without further question or argument. Bunce was always very stedfast in his ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... collie who lived to a good old age. She was deaf and infirm, and one hind-leg was paralysed, so that it dragged as she walked. I was taken ill, not seriously, nor so as in any way to affect my brain, but as my poor old dog would insist on coming and lying in my ...
— Animal Ghosts - Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter • Elliott O'Donnell
... glad you are come, my Lord, said Mr. Watson; sitting with such a poor infirm man has made Miss Warley thoughtful.—Upon my word, Sir, returned I, it was only the fear of increasing your head-ach that me silent.—I never was in higher spirits.—I could sing and dance this very moment. Well ...
— Barford Abbey • Susannah Minific Gunning
... of some past landslip, since buried under flowering earth. With its turned-back edge, it was hard to insert it below them, and again and again it came up having raised nothing but a little gravel; but the old man worked on still with his docile, child-like look, intent upon his task. Presently the infirm handle came off, and the shovel dropped into the bottom of the hole. At the same moment, with a wilder shriek and a fiercer on-rush, the fury came tearing again along the mountain side; the whole of the trees that yet remained in the patch of forest nearest ...
— A Loose End and Other Stories • S. Elizabeth Hall
... her fingers, and related how that she and Master Gammon had one day, six years distant, talked on a lonely evening over the mischances which befel poor people when they grew infirm, or met with accident, and what "useless clays" they were; and yet they had their feelings. It was a long and confidential talk on a summer evening; and, at the end of it, Master Gammon walked into Wrexby, and paid a visit to Mr. Hammond, the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Persons mentally infirm—that is, persons who, through mental infirmity arising from age or decay of their faculties, are incapable of ...
— Mental Defectives and Sexual Offenders • W. H. Triggs, Donald McGavin, Frederick Truby King, J. Sands Elliot, Ada G. Patterson, C.E. Matthews
... in the autumn of the year 1828, that an elderly and infirm gentleman was slowly pacing up and down in a large dining-room. He had apparently finished his dinner, although it was not yet five o'clock, and the descending sun shone bright and warm through the windows, which were level with the ground, and from which there was a view of a spacious ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... he had gained his feet, he took one of his crutches from under his arm, and raising it cast his eyes toward heaven, and said:—"I thank God that I have been enabled to come here this day, to perform my duty and to speak on a subject which has so deeply impressed my mind. I am old and infirm; I have one foot—more than one foot in the grave; I am risen from my bed to stand up in the cause of my country, perhaps never again to speak in this house." This was delivered in a feeble tone, but ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... a great friendship for this shoemaker; and he and his wife, a quiet, kind-hearted woman, were almost all the acquaintances that she cultivated. She had found out her husband's parents, but they were not of a description that at all pleased her. They were old and infirm, but they were of the true pauper breed, a sort of person whom Mrs. Deg had been taught to avoid and to despise. They looked on her as a sort of second parish, and insisted that she should come and live with them, and help to maintain them out of her earnings. ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... grandmamma, in Ireland. They would have gone last autumn, but for Guy's illness, and now Aunt Charlotte wrote to hasten the performance of the project. Lady Mabel was very anxious to see them, she said; and having grown much more infirm of late, seemed to think it would be the last meeting with her son. She talked so much of Mrs. Edmonstone and Laura, that it was plain that she wished extremely for a visit from them, though she did not like to ask it, in the ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... cold collations were served. Public opinion was a stern master. Woe betide the one rash enough to defy the established conventions! The physician on his rounds, or the church-goer too aged or infirm to walk to the place of worship, were the only ones permitted to make use of a horse and carriage. Now and then one of the godless would slip away northward for a drive on some unfrequented road. Detection meant society's averted face and stern reprimand. For an indefinite period the sinner would ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice
... aged, infirm, tottering man, we heard him descending the steps. How different from the step that carried him up! We, conscience-stricken, sat within, with doors closed. He was off. He has again mounted his horse, and the broken-hearted man, hardly less cruel than the expectant bridegroom, dashes ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... of the matter was this. The Willie-Goat had, for eighteen year, belonged to a dragoon marching regiment, and, in its better days, had seen a power of service abroad; till, being now old and infirm, it had fallen off one of the baggage-carts, and got its leg broken on the road to Piershill, where it was sold to Cursecowl, by a corporal, for half-a-crown and a dram. The four quarters he had managed to sell for mutton, like lightning—this one buying a jigget, ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... Executive duty upon this occasion there has not been wanting a just sensibility to the merits of the American Army during the late war; but the obvious policy and design in fixing an efficient military peace establishment did not afford an opportunity to distinguish the aged and infirm on account of their past services nor the wounded and disabled on account of their present sufferings. The extent of the reduction, indeed, unavoidably involved the exclusion of many meritorious officers of every rank from ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 1: James Madison • Edited by James D. Richardson
... Christ was eighty-two years of age, and exceedingly infirm; from whence it was supposed, that he could scarcely be heard. However, when he was taken to the place of execution, he expressed his religious sentiments with such courage, and at the same time composure of mind, as astonished even his enemies. ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... winter at the house of his son. That he might be prepared for journeying, as he proposed to do in the spring, he took with him his light wagon, and for the winter his sleigh, which he fastened behind the wagon. He was, as I have just told you, very old and infirm. His temples were covered with thinned locks which the frosts of eighty years had whitened. His sight, and hearing, too, were somewhat blunted by age, as yours will be should you ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... with, because "he is easily circumvented and not adroit in his business." He complains of the heat during an illness one summer, and the seigneurie give him the White Chamber in the town-hall, and when winter comes on, and he is old and infirm, they assign him the lodging lately occupied by Mathurin Cordier (famous schoolmaster Corderius, whose Dialogues were the first book in Latin of our grandfathers), because it contained a stove—a rare luxury. He thanks them for their kindness as his fathers, and makes ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... he ought to have had—old, weary, infirm, decently hiding its disabilities under a blanket, and, when this was stripped away, confessing them in a start so reluctant that they had to be explained as the stiffness natural to any young, strong, and fresh ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells
... few problems more profound than that of the courage with which men like him continue their self-imposed penal-servitude until they become too infirm to work and are sent to die in some refuge for aged freres. They have accepted celibacy and poverty, that they may the better devote their lives to the instruction of children. They have no sacerdotal state or ideal, no ecclesiastical nor social ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... marked coldness about his marriage and other private circumstances, a coldness which he had hitherto preferred to any warmth of familiarity between them. He deferred the intention from day to day, his habit of acting on his conclusions being made infirm by his repugnance to every possible conclusion and its consequent act. He saw Mr. Bulstrode often, but he did not try to use any occasion for his private purpose. At one moment he thought, "I will write a letter: I prefer that ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... principles of human nature, that the most delicate or afflicted child excites our tenderest feelings. 'I have seen men,' says Bunyan, 'take most care of, and best provide for those of their children that have been most infirm and helpless; and our Advocate "shall gather his lambs with his arms, and carry them in his bosom."'[238] While in this state of distress, the promise came to his relief—'Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve them ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... life, made and retained friends in ways so different from those of the noted heroines of the salons. In her youth, she was beautiful and fascinating, with numerous lovers and numberless suitors, but she grew even more famous as her age increased; when infirm and blind, and living in a convent, she ruled by virtue of her acknowledged authority and was still able to cope with the greatest philosophers, the chief and dean of whom, Voltaire, wrote the ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme
... at the Greyhound, Bath, I have been confined to my bed-room, almost to my bed. Pray for my recovery, and request Mr. Roberts's[89] prayers, for my infirm, wicked heart; that Christ may mediate to the Father, to lead me to Christ, and give me a living instead of a reasoning faith! and for my health, so far only as it may be the condition of my improvement, ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... the village church. There was much there to distract my attention, particularly in that rare sight, the ample white wig (the last of the wigs of Connecticut!) on the head of the venerable minister, who, though too infirm for much active service, still held his place in the pulpit; but I listened with all my might, intent on hearing something which I might remember, and repeat to please Cousin Mary Rose; for I knew that she would expect me to turn to the text, and would ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... and not at God, that man has begun upon a falsehood, and will soon get out of tune with heaven and earth. For consider, my friends: suppose some rich and mighty prince went out and collected a number of children, and of sick and infirm people, and said to them, "You cannot work now, but I will give you food, medicine, every thing that you require, and then you must help me to work; and I, though you have no right to expect it of me, ...
— Twenty-Five Village Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... the word of Abubeker Alwakel, the successor of the Prophet, and, after him, the first commander of true believers. 'Go forth,' he said, 'Yezed Ben Sophian,' when he sent that renowned general to take Syria from the infidels; 'quit yourselves like men in battle, but slay neither the aged, the infirm, the women, nor the children. Waste not the land, neither destroy corn and fruit-trees; they are the gifts of Allah. Keep faith when you have made any covenant, even if it be to your own harm. If ye find holy men labouring with ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... your own vassals and natural subjects, and with my sons staying at your royal court? I was twenty-eight years old when I came into your Highnesses' service,[417-2] and now I have not a hair upon me that is not gray; my body is infirm, and all that was left to me, as well as to my brothers, has been taken away and sold, even to the frock that I wore, to my great dishonor. I cannot but believe that this was done without your royal permission. The restitution of my honor, the reparation of my losses, and the punishment ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various
... looking upon them, it was impossible not to note the sorrow stamped upon her gentle features. Paulina was interested and entered into conversation with her. She learned that she was a young married woman; that her husband had gone to sea; leaving his mother, a very infirm old woman to her care. Soon after his departure, Mary left her father's more comfortable dwelling to reside in the old woman's cabin, so that she could take the better care of her. A sheep was her only fortune and she took it with her. It had two lambs, and ...
— Paulina and her Pets • Anonymous
... upon his face. It was an old face, a stern face, with white eyebrows and a thin-lipped mouth. Just such a face as looked on with approval when the executioner held up the head of Charles I., at Whitehall. There was, however, a tremble about the chin that told of infirm health. ...
— Cap'n Eri • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... broke off to stare at her, flushed and a little breathless as she always was in discussions and unbelievably youthful and beautiful still, and finished in quite another key—"that you're getting positively lovelier with each ridiculous birthday—and your aged and infirm spouse more and more besottedly in love ...
— Play the Game! • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... who makes the one-minded to dwell in his Father's house, that he vouchsafe to signify to us by heavenly wonders which institution we ought to follow, by what ways to hasten to the entrance of his kingdom. Let an infirm man be brought hither to us, and, through whose prayer soever he be healed, let his belief and practice be believed acceptable to God, and ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... one by one, who came in balancing themselves with different movements, one canting to the right, while the other canted to the left. And three worthy women showed themselves, limping, dragging their legs behind them, crippled by illness and deformed through old age, three infirm old women, past service, the only three pensioners in the establishment which Sister Saint-Benedict managed, who were able ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... and rivilled face of ancient usage Hobbes said that if he Had been at college as long as others— Hold a stiff rein upon suspicion Home anxieties and a mind enslaved by wearing complaints Homer: The only words that have motion and action Honour of valour consists in fighting, not in subduing How infirm and decaying material this fabric of ours is How many and many times he has been mistaken in his own judgment How many more have died before they arrived at thy age How many several ways has death to surprise us? "How many things," said he, "I do not desire!" ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Michel De Montaigne • Michel De Montaigne
... accuracy as far as she reaches. There is a wide difference between elementary knowledge and superficial knowledge—between a firm beginning, and an infirm attempt at compassing. A woman may always help her husband by what she knows, however little; by what she half-knows, or mis-knows, ...
— Sesame and Lilies • John Ruskin
... over their eyes. The cows, held by long ropes, obeyed a mere twitch or a special low call back to the roadside, knowing very well that, the danger once past, they could finish their browsing in the next field. Old mother Tonsard, who was getting more and more infirm, succeeded Mouche in his duties, after Fourchon, under pretence of caring for his natural grandson's education, kept him to himself; while Marie and Catherine made hay in the woods. These girls knew the exact spots where the fine forest-grass abounded, and there they ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... in his power to save me both trouble and expense in the different arrangements relative to the custom-house, remise, &c. and the good-natured assiduity with which he bustled about in despatching these matters gave me an opportunity of observing, in his use of the infirm limb, a much greater degree of activity than I had ever before, except in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 474 - Vol. XVII. No. 474., Supplementary Number • Various
... and so is The Idiot Boy to hundreds. It is in the character of the old man to tell his story, which an impatient reader must feel tedious. But, good heavens! Such a figure, in such a place; a pious, self-respecting, miserably infirm and pleased old man, ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers
... many years. The first was the death of poor Eleanor, whose worthless husband had died of excess some months before; the second incident was the marriage of Elizabeth Brudenell to the old pastor of her parish, who repented of his celibacy because he had become infirm, and took a wife because he required a nurse; and the third was the visit of the Countess of Hurstmonceux and Mr. Brudenell, who came and spent a few months among their friends in America, and then returned to their delightful ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... with me? Thank you: I shall be glad of someone to carry the lantern. We may have to do some scrambling: Narracott is infirm, and Roger,"—this was the footman—"is a chicken-hearted ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... remembered it as a path that was quite easy to traverse either up or down. But Old Pipes had been a very active man, and as his mother was so much older than he was, he never thought of himself as aged and infirm. ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... said the Saxish men in their communing together: "Take we six knights, wise men and active, and skilful spies, and send we to the court, in almsman's guise, and dwell in the court, with the high king, and every day pass through all the people; and go to the king's dole, as if they were infirm, and among the poor people hearken studiously if man might with craft, by day or by night, in Winchester's town come to Uther Pendragon, and kill the king with murder;"—then were (would be) their will wholly accomplished, then were they careless of Constanine's ...
— Brut • Layamon
... political opponents ran high against Somers. At the close of 1699 they had a majority in the Commons, and deprived him of office, but they failed before the Lords in an impeachment against him. In Queen Anne's reign, between 1708 and 1710, the constitutional statesman, long infirm of health, who had been in retirement serving Science as President of the Royal Society, was serving the State as President of the Council. But in 1712, when Addison addressed to him this Dedication of the first Volume of the first reprint of 'the ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... had grown so old and infirm that one day they sent for Abe to come and put an end to his misery. Every man on the farm loved the old dog and not one of them would raise a hand to kill him. Hope and I heard what Abe was coming to do, and when the men ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... 1780, Lord Cornwallis, elated with his victory at Camden, entered Charlotte, with the confident expectation of soon restoring North Carolina to the British Crown. Patrick Jack was then an old and infirm man, having given up the chief control of his public house to his son, Captain James Jack; but neither age nor infirmity could enlist the sympathies of the British soldiery. The patriotic character of the house had become extensively known through Tory information, and its destruction was ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter
... of the said Jonathan Sewell; that Jonathan Sewell had advised the arrest of Messrs. Bedard, Blanchet and Taschereau, upon an unfounded pretext; that Jonathan Sewell had instigated the oppression of the old and infirm Francois Corbeil, by which the old man lost his life; that Jonathan Sewell had instigated Sir James Henry Craig to issue a proclamation causing the public to believe that Mr. Bedard had been guilty of treason, and that the province was in a state ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... mother's side; who was rich in money, and had besides an estate in land of 1500L. a year. He always declared, that, for the sake of his sister's children, he would continue a single man; and kept his word till he was upwards of seventy; when, being very infirm in health, and defective even to dotage in his understanding, Bolton, his steward, who had always stood in the way of his inclination to have his eldest niece for his companion and manager, at last contrived to get him married to ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... vicar was old and supine; he accepted gladly the volunteered services of his zealous coadjutors, and, led by his faithful Johnnie, Mr. Ferrers penetrated into the winding alleys, and carried comfort to many a sick and dying bed. And as Mr. Brabazon grew more infirm, it became a rule to Mr. Ferrers to occupy his pulpit on Sunday evenings, and it was always remarked that on these occasions the church was crowded; people would come ten or twelve miles to hear the blind clergyman ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... is gone," he said, bitterly, and though his calm remained, his bearing was less erect, his face was deathly pale and his step so infirm that he leaned upon General Breckinridge as he neared the door—in the bitterest moment, perhaps, ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... had come to the top of the Corso, and cut down a woman who was passing by. As soon as the Corso was cleared, the gendarmes went into the different cafes along the street, and ordered all persons, who were found in them, to go home at once. In one case an infirm old man, who could not make off fast enough, had his face cut open by a sabre-blow; while the backs of the gendarmes' swords were used plentifully to expedite the departure of the cafe frequenters. The exact number of ...
— Rome in 1860 • Edward Dicey
... the bread-winners, were gone; and yet the tax-gatherer would come and press for every impost—on the onion-field, the date-palm, the dourha-field, and the clump of sugar- cane, as though the young men, the toilers, were still there. The old and infirm, the children, the women, must now double and treble their labour. The old men must go to the corvee, and mend the banks of the Nile for the Prince and his pashas, providing their own food, their own tools, their own housing, if housing there would be—if it was more than sleeping ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... to saunter. Danders, cinders. Daurna, dare not. Deave, to deafen. Denty, dainty. Dirdum, vigour. Disjaskit, worn out, disreputable-looking. Doer, law agent. Dour, hard. Drumlie, dark. Dunting, knocking. Dwaibly, infirm, rickety. Dule-tree, the ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... who had not sworn brotherhood with Sigurd. He was Guttorm, Gunnar's and Hoegni's half-brother. Brynhild went to Guttorm. He would not slay Sigurd, but Brynhild found that he was infirm of will and unsteady of thought. With Guttorm, then, she would work for the slaying of Sigurd. Her mind was fixed that he and she would no longer be in the world ...
— The Children of Odin - The Book of Northern Myths • Padraic Colum
... "The infirm moghul, therefore, continued his vaudeville, which was mainly confined within the palace walls at Delhi, and persisted in his endeavors ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder
... a little order was restored by the Provost, who was a sensible old man, and an old soldier to boot, but too infirm to take as active a part in such an emergency as he would have done had he been a dozen years younger. He, with several of the principal men of the town, went down to the beach to receive the bearers ...
— The Lighthouse • R.M. Ballantyne
... and three years later he was promoted to the see of Salisbury, over which he presided for twelve years, prosecuting his benevolent designs with unwearied industry. As at St David's, so at Salisbury, he founded a Church Union Society for the assistance of infirm and distressed clergymen. He strenuously opposed both Unitarianism and Catholic emancipation. He died on the 19th of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... then, an affair of sex? No! but women are commonly in a state of dependence, and are not likely to exercise their reason with freedom. Well! and does not this ground of exclusion apply with equal or greater force to the poor, to the infirm, to men in embarrassed circumstances, to all, in short, whose maintenance, be it scanty, or be it ample, depends on the will of others? How far are we to go? Where must we stop? What classes should we admit? Whom must we disfranchise? ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge
... through the recommendation of Dr. Russel, and by the means of his writing in favour of sea water, it is become one of the principal places in the kingdom for the resort of the idle and dissipated, as well as the diseased and infirm." ...
— Seaward Sussex - The South Downs from End to End • Edric Holmes
... "There," he cried, "is a truly Catholic prince, there a true defender of the faith! I expected no less of him."[1240] And Philip intended to carry his menaces into effect. On the twenty-fifth of October his secretary, Courteville, left Madrid, ostensibly on a visit to his infirm father in Flanders, but in reality intrusted with a very important commission, which, in an age when it was no uncommon thing for a messenger to be waylaid and robbed of his despatches, could scarcely be otherwise discharged. ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... at this time old and infirm, was aroused from his slumbers by the dreadful din, and immediately began to seize his armor, and to prepare himself for rushing into the fight. His wife, however, Hecuba, begged and entreated him to desist. She saw that all was lost, and that any farther attempts at resistance ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... Feri, however, partially succeeded in restoring order amongst the panic-stricken inhabitants, and revived the fainting courage of the soldiers. In a short time, all the Moors capable of bearing arms were ready for defence, whilst the old and infirm, the women and children, busied themselves in collecting their scanty goods, and placing them securely on their beasts of burthen, as they anticipated the probability of a speedy retreat from their habitations. They evinced no signs of sorrow or reluctance ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... one daughter, and she, too, was out at work. She was housekeeper to an infirm old farmer; that is to say, she superintended the dairy and the kitchen, and received hardly as much as a cook in a London establishment. Like the sons, she was finely developed physically, and had more of the manners of a lady than seemed ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... American' party, I would see what could be done. He had got upon the roof of the institution,—just where he could slip backward with great ease, though it took some effort to go forward. Being somewhat infirm of age, I took him gently by the hand and assisted him in, where I thought he might, if he pleased, stand upon a square platform. The General was very polite, bore strongly in his demeanor the marks of time and honor; I could not suppress the capricious thought—that it was time a sly corner ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... have indeed mourned his death, because I lost in him a kind friend who had always taken a sincere interest in my welfare; but he was become too infirm to enjoy comfort, and then to die is a blessing. I am glad he left your son his estate, but it was want of knowing the world if he thought of improving the Property by keeping him ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)
... master. By means of a friend in the town, (for they were not all devils at Orange, as he emphatically assured us), he was enabled to procure a few common necessaries, to improve the scanty prison allowance of some of the more infirm; but his charitable labour soon ceased, for all were successively dispatched by the guillotine in a short space of time. In the course of three months, 378 persons perished by decree of the miscreants composing the Revolutionary tribunal at Orange, whose names were Fauvette, ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes
... days, when it was difficult for the aged pastor to wade through the deep snow down to the chapel, Mass was said in his own house. The people crowded in at the door of his little living-room, and would fill the kitchen. When he grew old and infirm it was impossible for the greater number to hear anything of the sermon; yet he ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... him the bitter hostility of the then dominant majority in both Houses of Congress, led by a man of unbridled passions and of extraordinary energy, Thaddeus Stevens, a representative from Pennsylvania, a sort of American Couthon, infirm of body but all compact of will. It was the purpose of this majority to humiliate and chastise, not to conciliate, the defeated South. Already, under President Lincoln, this purpose had brought the leaders of the majority more than once into collision with the Executive. Under President ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... drivel is uttered by the Nestor of the commonwealth, an infirm old man, with one foot in the grave. In order, however, to make the course pursued by this gentleman and the next speaker intelligible to the English reader, we may explain that, by the annexation of Texas, the Southern States have a majority of votes ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... written over sixty years before, was not so easily met. First came the assurance that its spelling was hideous, its writing bad and dimmed by time, and the sheets tattered and torn. Later followed the disclosure that an aged and infirm mother of the grandmother owned it, and that she had some time before compelled its return to the private drawer from which the relic-loving daughter had abstracted it. Still later came a letter saying that since the attorney was ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... would doubtless have chosen a romance, or some light tale sure to interest for the hour, and so amuse the old lady. But Beth erroneously judged that the aged and infirm love sober and scholarly books, and picked out a treatise that proved ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces • Edith Van Dyne
... lamentation so strangely mixed that it might have been difficult to have said which passion preponderated. None, however, was idle. Some bore their choicest articles, others their young, and some their aged and infirm, into the forest, which spread itself like a verdant carpet of bright green against the side of the mountain. Thither Tamenund also retired, with calm composure, after a short and touching interview with Uncas; from whom the sage separated with the reluctance ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... privacy of her bedchamber and seated before the little white-enamel desk with its chintz-covered fittings that suited so well the simple, cheerful scheme of decoration, the girl lingered long, an idle pencil caught between fingers infirm of purpose. Her gaze was fixed as if hypnotised to the blank white face of the bit of cardboard that lay before her on the blotting-pad, her thoughts far astray in a dark jungle of horror, doubts, ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... of necessity proceeded like a capitalist in respect to recognizing and dealing only with effective workers. It took no more cognizance of the existence of the women, except when workers, or the children, or the old, or the infirm, crippled, or sick, or other dependents on the workers than the capitalists had been in the habit of doing. But when the nation gathered into its hands the entire economic resources of the country it proceeded to administer them on the principle—proclaimed, indeed, ...
— Equality • Edward Bellamy
... abbe's suspicions, in spite of his first enthusiasm at the penitence of the sinner. The Carmelites had persecuted him in his youth, and in the end the prior had driven him to secularize himself. The prior was still alive, old but implacable; infirm, and withdrawn from the world, but strong in his hatred, and his passion for intrigue. The abbe could not hear his name without shuddering, and he begged me to act prudently in ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... it appears that the common practice of reading all three together, is an innovation, and if an ancient or infirm clergyman do read them at two or three several times, he is more strictly conformable; however, this is much better than to omit any part of the liturgy, or to read all three offices into one, as is now commonly done, without any ...
— The Seaboard Parish Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... with merciless annihilation. The population, just then enjoying the games in the amphitheatre outside of the "downtown" district, had had hardly time to save their belongings. They escaped with their bare lives. Only the aged, the infirm, the prisoners and some faithful dogs were left behind. Today their bodies in plaster casts may be seen, mute witnesses to a frightful disaster. The town was covered with an airtight blanket of ashes, lava and fine pumice stone. There was no prolonged death struggle, no perceivable decay ...
— Cooking and Dining in Imperial Rome • Apicius
... intense glow and in its towering and incessant volume. There was remarkable subtlety, also, in the manner in which that feeling was tempered. In Lear's meeting with Goneril after the curse you saw at once the broken condition of an aged, infirm, and mentally disordered man, who had already forgotten his own terrible words. "We'll no more meet, no more see one another" is a line to which McCullough gave its full eloquence of abject mournfulness and forlorn desolation. Other denotements of subtlety were seen in his ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... and sally forth in grand procession, with banners flying, to meet the princess and her company and do them honour, and let cry throughout the city that neither cloistered damsel nor honoured lady nor infirm old woman should fail to go forth to meet the bride. So they all went out to meet her and the chiefest of them vied in doing her service, meaning to bring her to the King's palace by night. Moreover, the grandees agreed to decorate the road and stand on either side, whilst the bride should pass ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous
... easily, speaking justly and speaking seasonably: It is offending against the last, to speak of entertainments before the indigent; of sound limbs and health before the infirm; of houses and lands before one who has not so much as a dwelling; in a word, to speak of your prosperity before the miserable; this conversation is cruel, and the comparison which naturally arises in ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various
... independent of his friend's assistance than formerly; for, at the suggestion of the teachers, his parishioners had contributed little sums—a dime, a quarter, and a few a half-dollar apiece—to get him one of those wheeled chairs which are worked by the hands, and by means of which the infirm are frequently enabled to move about without other aid. It was the first time they had ever given anything to a minister of their own, and it was hard for those who had to support families upon a pittance which in other parts of the country would mean ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... me questions; do not inquire; at any rate, not at present. I will endeavour—now at least I will endeavour—to do my duty. But do not urge me by questions, or appear to notice me if I am infirm." ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... dreamless hours Life moves among these, handling and considering each of the unredeemable multitude; and when morning light strikes the dark chimneys again and they rush forth, some that entered young have matured; some of the old have become infirm; many of which have dropped in singly issue as companies; and young broods flutter forth, unaccountable nestlings of a night, which were not in yesterday's blue at all. Then there are the missing—those ...
— The Mettle of the Pasture • James Lane Allen
... passing the gate he was run into by a man who came rushing out of the yard, in a state of violent agitation. In this man's hand was something that glittered, and though the encounter nearly upset them both, he had not stopped to utter an apology, but stumbled away out of sight with a hasty but infirm step, which showed he was neither young nor active. The minister had failed to see his face, but noticed the ends of a long beard blowing over his ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green
... even thus far into the snare of this Moabitish woman?—hast thou bartered thy name, thy allegiance, thy knightly oath, thy duty to thy parents, thy country, and thy God, for a feigned tear, or a sickly smile, from lips which flattered the infirm Francis—lured to death the idiot Darnley—read luscious poetry with the minion Chastelar—mingled in the lays of love which were sung by the beggar Rizzio—and which were joined in rapture to those of ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... that if I had to go, it was my intention to make easy stages and to take with me the workmen Ascanio and Pagolo, whom I had brought from Rome. Moreover, I wanted a servant on horseback to be at my orders, and money sufficient for my costs upon the way. The infirm old man replied, upon a tone of mighty haughtiness, that the sons of dukes were wont to travel as I had described, and in no other fashion. I retorted that the sons of my art travelled in the way I had informed him, and that not being a duke's son, I knew nothing about the customs of such folk; ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... rest of the clergy, he bent before the blast, taking the oath to the King, and submitting to the royal supremacy, but swearing under protest, as the phrase went, with the outward, and not with the inward man—in fact, perjuring himself. Though infirm, so far, however, he was too honest to be a successful counterfeit, and from the jealous eyes of the Neologians of the abbey he could not conceal his tendencies. We have significant evidence of the espionage which was established, over all suspected quarters, in ...
— Froude's Essays in Literature and History - With Introduction by Hilaire Belloc • James Froude
... dinner-time about her lack of moral ideas, and accurately described the thin wine on the table as "water-bewitched"). Why did n't the baroness go back to England, if she was so tired of Switzerland? Well, she was too infirm now; and, besides, she did n't like to trust herself on the railroads. And there were so many new inventions nowadays, of which she read. What was this nitroglycerine, that exploded so dreadfully? No: she thought she ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... the magnificent plant that hung its purple gems beside the marble fountain, he placed a kind of mask over his mouth and nostrils, as if all this beauty did but conceal a deadlier malice; but, finding his task still too dangerous, he drew back, removed the mask, and called loudly, but in the infirm voice of a person affected with inward disease, ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... means of writing as a very rare treasure and pleasure. And with fingers that almost trembled with delight, I wrote down paper and pens and a bottle of ink for Darry. Next, I heard of an old woman at the quarters, who was ailing and infirm, and I am afraid ill-treated, who at all events was in need of comfort, and had nothing but straw and the floor to rest her poor bones on at night. A soft pallet for her went down instantly on my list; ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... what you say," replied little Marie; "but I am thinking of what my mother has always told me: that a woman of sixty is much to be pitied when her husband is seventy or seventy-five and can't work any longer to support her. He grows infirm, and she must take care of him at an age when she herself is beginning to have great need of care and rest. That is how people come to end their lives ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... white roses clambered in all directions over the wall, and the little lawn in front was tastefully laid out, and the turf and shrubs kept in perfect order. Along the gravel walks of this little lawn, walked slowly, as if in infirm health, a middle-aged lady, leaning for support on the arm of a tall and graceful girl; and ever and anon she turned on her companion's suffering face a look of such love and sweetness—it was sure to create a smile even on the wan lips of the invalid. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... by the way on Mr. Hector Maclean, the Minister of Col, whom we found in a hut, that is, a house of only one floor, but with windows and chimney, and not inelegantly furnished. Mr. Maclean has the reputation of great learning: he is seventy-seven years old, but not infirm, with a look of venerable dignity, excelling what I remember ...
— A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland • Samuel Johnson
... master—for such he felt that Catiline now was indeed—however he might strive to conceal the fact; endeavor to learn what were his real objects; and then determine what should be his own course of action. Doubtful, and weak of principle, and most infirm of purpose, he shrunk alike from breaking the oath he had been entrapped into taking, and from committing ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... leader in the minister of war, General Desiderio Arias, a chronic revolutionist from Monte Cristi, who had for years used the popularity of Jimenez as a cloak for his own aspirations. The president, aged and infirm, was unable to meet the situation with energy, and disinclined to ...
— Santo Domingo - A Country With A Future • Otto Schoenrich
... further agree to supply the undersigned severally with all the necessaries of life, as clothing, meat, drink, lodging, etc., for themselves and their families. And this provision is not limited to their days of health and strength; but when any of them shall become sick, infirm, or otherwise unfit for labor, the same support and maintenance shall be allowed as before, together with such medicine, care, attendance, and consolation as their situation may reasonably demand. And if at any time after they have become members of the association, the father or mother ...
— The Communistic Societies of the United States • Charles Nordhoff
... well, Joseph. Monsieur the Mayor and Monsieur the Commandant know that you are lame; that is easy enough to be seen. They replied at once, Eh, Monsieur Goulden, the young man is lame; why speak of him? Do not be uneasy; we do not want the infirm; ...
— The Conscript - A Story of the French war of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... remarked, "he had better not, especially at night, when carriages are passing along."[48] However, all persons have an undoubted right to walk on the beaten track of a road, if it has no sidewalk, even if infirm with age or disease, and are entitled to the exercise of reasonable care on the part of persons driving vehicles along it. If there is a sidewalk which is in bad condition, or obstructed by merchandise or otherwise, then the foot-passenger has a right to walk on the road if he ...
— The Road and the Roadside • Burton Willis Potter
... the quiet enjoyment of liberty and rest, and genuine friendship, from all of which I had fasted so long; and in the earnest prosecution of my studies, to recover what I had lost during my stay at Wellwood House, and to lay in new stores for future use. My father's health was still very infirm, but not materially worse than when I last saw him; and I was glad I had it in my power to cheer him by my return, and to amuse him with singing his ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... very old, monsieur, and very infirm. I have often thought, in my lonely hours, of the unhappiness of my child on her marriage with you, and have doubted the wisdom of that authority which I exercised so severely over her. The vision of that pale, agonized countenance, comes upon me like a reproach; and although ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various
... not a lucky man—that is to be seen," Thorstan said then. "And he has no great knowledge of the sea, and is moreover infirm. It would come to this, that he would hurt himself, and you would have the care of him as you did upon the rock ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett
... drinking wine at all, for a certain stated period. Readers do not need to be reminded how often young Pepys was under a vow not to drink; and the device by which the jovial admiralty clerk strengthened an infirm will and defended himself against temptation was frequently employed by right-minded young men of his date. In some cases, instead of vowing not to drink, they bound themselves not to drink within a certain period; two ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... not idle days either, for with Sunday-school, church service, and prayer meetings, our day is pretty well filled. Some of our girls are doing real missionary work by going out into the neighborhood, to relieve the sick, read to the old and infirm, and to carry food where it is needed. This they seem to enjoy, and it will, perhaps, prepare them for usefulness as they go out ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 10, October, 1889 • Various
... offended him, and behaved, moreover, through all this tribulation with such becoming solemnity, that he very soon began rather to gain than to lose by his martyrdom. Each step he took was discretion itself. His father, people learnt, had been quietly removed to a retreat for the mentally infirm, situated, some said in Devonshire, and others in North Wales. The very ambiguity on this point was highly approved. It argued the perfection of prudence. As for the ungrateful girl who had jilted him, he had talked at considerable length to his friends on that subject, and they reported ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... woman seems too dull or too ill to feel her own position. She moves as though in a dream—a dream undisturbed, for the buyers have almost ceased to regard her. Finally she is sold for forty-three dollars to a very old and infirm man. ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... accession. He organized his party, collected arms and munitions of war, and did all that he could to ingratiate himself with the most powerful and wealthy nobles. He sought the favor of the king, too, and endeavored to persuade him to discard William. The king was now old and infirm, and was growing more and more inert and gloomy as he advanced in age. His mind was occupied altogether in ecclesiastical rites and observances, or plunged in a torpid and lifeless melancholy, which made him averse to giving any thought to the ...
— William the Conqueror - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... by the same law as other people. (16) If a man has sexual intercourse with a woman to whom he is engaged, he shall not be punished, since they are already married in the eye of God. (17) No person who is infirm shall be compelled by priests to make a will. (18) The sacrament shall not be withheld from any one for debt or other reason. The church or priest has a remedy in court. (19) Fines for adultery and fornication belong to the king, not to the bishop. (20) The Gospel shall hereafter be taught ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson
... in several ways that a bishop is hindered from procuring the spiritual welfare of his subjects. Sometimes on account of his own defect, either of conscience (for instance if he be guilty of murder or simony), or of body (for example if he be old or infirm), or of irregularity arising, for instance, from bigamy. Sometimes he is hindered through some defect in his subjects, whom he is unable to profit. Hence Gregory says (Dial. ii, 3): "The wicked must be borne ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... gentleman, M. Court, has lately published in La Religion Laique a series of articles upon this subject that have attracted much attention. He proposes the establishment of a national fund for the support of the aged and infirm, managed by eight members chosen annually, half by the Chamber of Deputies, half by the Senate. The fund is to be raised by legacies and donations; by a gift from the state of ten millions of francs; by a percentage deducted by the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... servant and companion; she was a converted person, worshipping with a kindred sect, the Bible Christians. I remember being much interested in hearing how Bess, before her marriage, became converted. Mary Grace, on account of her infirm health, slept alone in one room; in another, of vast size, stood a family fourposter, where Ann slept with Drusilla Elliott, and another bed in the same room took Bess. The sisters and their friend had been constantly praying that Bess might 'find peace', for she was still a stranger to salvation. ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... "Is to-day an infirm old woman, a worthy object of the compassion of charitable people," continued M. Moriaz, heedless of this last interruption. "Mlle. Moriaz allows her a pension, with which I find no fault; but Mlle. Galet—I mistake, ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... be found in the independent government so long as it continues independent? And what though some pious minister and people embrace the independent way! This dazzles not the eyes of the intelligent, but of the infirm; we are to be regulated by Scripture warrant, not by human examples. The best of saints have failed in the ecclesiastical affairs; what a sharp contention was there between Paul and Barnabas, Acts xv. 39, &c.; what a dangerous dissimulation was there in ...
— The Divine Right of Church Government • Sundry Ministers Of Christ Within The City Of London
... I should not be left to trust to that very suspicious sort of merit which constitutes an exception in the history of mankind, and recommends itself as the total abolitionist of all previous claims on our confidence. You are not greatly surprised at the infirm logic of the coachman who would persuade you to engage him by insisting that any other would be sure to rob you in the matter of hay and corn, thus demanding a difficult belief in him as the sole ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... wishes, in his prospect of soon quitting his present curacy, and obtaining that of Uppercross instead. It had then seemed the object nearest her heart, that Dr Shirley, the rector, who for more than forty years had been zealously discharging all the duties of his office, but was now growing too infirm for many of them, should be quite fixed on engaging a curate; should make his curacy quite as good as he could afford, and should give Charles Hayter the promise of it. The advantage of his having to come only to Uppercross, instead ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... taken in your name, as I am straightforward in these matters. Think of my proposal, and make what inquiries you like concerning me. I have not yet attained my majority, but shall do so in five months and three days, when I shall inherit my mother's fortune. My father is wealthy, but old and infirm. From four to six in the afternoon of the next few days I will be in a carriage at the corner of ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... to shoot all the able-bodied Paupers that had accumulated within the year. Let Governments think of this. The expense were trifling: nay the very carcasses would pay it. Have them salted and barrelled; could not you victual therewith, if not Army and Navy, yet richly such infirm Paupers, in workhouses and elsewhere, as enlightened Charity, dreading no evil of them, might see good to ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... instant a full meaning of the situation flashed into Donald's mind. The camp was deserted of all except the infirm and very aged. All the others—men, women, children, and even the very dogs—had gone to participate in the festivities of the up-river camps to which so many white prisoners had that day been taken. He shuddered to contemplate the nature of these festivities,—the tortures, the anguish, and the ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... had died in 1717, and the poet, rejecting politely but firmly the suggestion of his friend, Atterbury, that he might now turn Protestant, devoted himself with double tenderness to the care of his aged and infirm mother. He brought her with him to Twickenham, where she lived till 1733, dying in that year at the great age of ninety-one. It may have been partly on her account that Pope pitched upon Twickenham as his abiding place. Beautifully situated ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... connected themselves with these subjects, was precisely of a kind to captivate the good old knight; besides the convenience which he found in having a friend to appeal to when his own memory, as frequently happened, proved infirm and played him false concerning names and dates, which, and all similar deficiencies, Master Michael Mumblazen supplied with due brevity and discretion. And, indeed, in matters concerning the modern world, he often gave, in his enigmatical and heraldic phrase, ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... made a sad distraction from the sorrow for the dead. The three old people, who now formed the household in the Chapel-house, went about slowly and dreamily, each with a dull wonder at their hearts why they, the infirm and worn-out, were left, while she was taken in her ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... double entendre "and the infirm letters (viz. a, w and y) not subject to accidence, left him." The three make up the root ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton
... Hvamm, where he stayed with Aud the Deep-Minded. He had been with her over the sea in the West, and she received him with welcome. Her grandson, Olaf Feilan, was then grown up, and Aud was very infirm. She consulted Onund concerning her kinsman Olaf, for whom she wished to ask in marriage Alfdis of the Barra Isles, the cousin of Onund's wife Aesa. Onund thought it a very suitable match, and Olaf rode with him to the South. Then Onund met friends and kinsmen, who made him their guest. The matter ...
— Grettir The Strong - Grettir's Saga • Unknown |
