"Possessive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... her interrogation point. At the day of Pentecost people were saying, "What do these things mean?" To-day they never think of saying it. I have been told in a little pamphlet issued by an English writer that the church has lost her possessive case, which means that somehow she has gone on without realizing that the risen, glorified Christ is her blessed Lord. It is a great thing to say "Jesus"; infinitely greater is it to say "My Jesus." ...
— And Judas Iscariot - Together with other evangelistic addresses • J. Wilbur Chapman
... delicately beautiful fragment of dreamy metaphor. There is probably a slight misprint in the last line, since the construction there becomes somewhat obscure. "My Love's Eyes" has merit, but lacks polish. The word "azure" in the first stanza, need not be in the possessive case; whilst the use of a singular verb with a plural noun in the second stanza (smiles-beguiles) is a little less than grammatical. "Longing" exhibits the author at her best, the images and phraseology alike ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... little that the article "the" should have replaced the possessive pronoun "my." But on reflection she decided that one might not unreasonably object to confessing in so many words to the possession of a dog who so persistently did all the things he ought not to do. And, anyway, it was nice of Mr. Maclin to ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... the same way that she had done when she was ill and asked if I liked bitters concealed. She waited as long without reply. The pause grew oppressive, and I spanned it by an assurance of individual possessive happiness. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various
... and nad bi mui na tai. Muisse is in old Irish the possessive of the first sing when followed by a noun it becomes mo, when not so followed it is mui; tai is also found for do. O'Curry gave this line as "there is ...
— Heroic Romances of Ireland Volumes 1 and 2 Combined • A. H. Leahy
... affairs were manipulated in good and regular order, they soon ceased to feel any apparent curiosity about it. Betty, who sometimes rebelled at remaining so scrupulously incognita, defiantly took the limelight at intervals and moved among the assembled guests with an authoritative and possessive air, adjusting and rearranging small details, and acknowledging the presence of habitues, but since her attentions were popularly supposed to be those of a superior head waitress, she soon tired of the gesture of ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... brightness, I followed Miss McCray about the boat. It was as if the hotel belonged to the girls, while in the Christian homes it had been as if everything belonged, not to the girls, but to benevolent though carefully possessive Christians. Miss McCray praised highly the manager and ...
— Making Both Ends Meet • Sue Ainslie Clark and Edith Wyatt
... the proper endings, we are left free to attend to the thought rather than to the vehicle of its expression. Although our pronouns are still declined, the sole inflection of our nouns, with the exception of a few like ox, oxen, or mouse, mice, is the addition of 's, s, or es for the possessive and the plural. Modern German, on the other hand, still retains these troublesome case endings. How did English have the ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... extortioner, most decidedly!" she returned, without repudiating the possessive pronoun. "It doesn't follow that I think anything of him—apart from what you did between you ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... consuming fire of his ardent gaze, and in the fierce embrace that was drawing her shaking limbs closer and closer against the man's own pulsating body. She writhed in his arms as he crushed her to him in a sudden access of possessive passion. His head bent slowly down to her, his eyes burned deeper, and, held immovable, she endured the first kiss she had ever received. And the touch of his scorching lips, the clasp of his arms, the close union with his warm, ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... possess an emotional temperament. All that was outer was fascinating, all that was inner suggested coldness. After experience assured me that all who came to know her shared this estimate, even in those days when every man on the ship was willing to be her slave. She had a compelling atmosphere, a possessive presence; and yet her mind at this time was unemotional—like Octavia, the wife of Mark Antony, "of a cold conversation." She was striking and unusual in appearance, and yet well within convention and "good form." Her dress was simply and modestly worn, and had little touches of grace and taste ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... truth is, that he could no more help being the central figure than a lion could in any gathering of lesser creatures; the fact that he was Roosevelt decided that. He did use the personal pronoun "I," and the possessive pronoun "My," with such frequency as to irritate good persons who were quite as egotistical as he—if that be egotism—but who used such modest circumlocutions as "the present writer," or "one," to camouflage their self-conceit. Roosevelt enjoyed almost all his experiences with equal ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... column," answered Banneker with perceptible emphasis on the possessive, "doesn't believe that cigarettes are good ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... squares, in syllables of fire, and sketched and summarised, further and further, in the dim fire-dust of endless avenues; that was all of the essence of fond and thrilled and throbbing recognition, with a thousand things understood and a flood of response conveyed, a whole familiar possessive feeling ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James
... of grade superior to his own, an officer must use the possessive adjective; a senior addressing a junior uses the title of the grade only. Thus: A major to a colonel says "Mon colonel," but the colonel to ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department
... usual idiomatic mode of expressing possession of parts of the body, wearing apparel, etc., by the use of the definite article instead of the possessive adjective his, her, etc., the dative pronoun also being often added to indicate the possessor, as: Yo me corte el dedo, ...
— Novelas Cortas • Pedro Antonio de Alarcon
... lay around, very hot and shiny, and content. Large backsheesh was assured, and they looked up at her with pleased possessive eyes, as an achievement of their own; hardly realising how large a part her finely developed athletic powers and elastic limbs had played in the speed of ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay
... establish himself in Ann's thoughts he had certainly succeeded. Odd snatches of his conversation kept recurring to her mind—his coolly possessive: "I don't like losing my belongings," followed by that equally significant: "The future would be mine." It was outrageous! Apparently Brett Forrester had never got beyond the primitive idea of the cave-man who captured his chosen mate by force of his good right arm and club, and subsequently ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler |
