"Presentiment" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... hard together and sighed. She spake not, but her lips moved in prayer as if deprecating some danger, or combating some presentiment ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... of the town by one of those occult impulses of the soul which lead us to follow hope irrationally. Thoughts conceived under the dominion of that spell are often realized; but we then attribute their pre-vision to a power we call presentiment,—an inexplicable power, but a real one,—which our passions find accommodating, like a flatterer who, among his many lies, does sometimes ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... separated from them now a full day and a half, and many a change might take place—many a danger might arise in that time. In fact, he began to blame himself for having left them alone. It would have been better to have let his cattle perish. So thought he now. A presentiment that all was not right was gradually forming in his mind; and he grew more anxious ...
— The Bush Boys - History and Adventures of a Cape Farmer and his Family • Captain Mayne Reid
... servant could answer these questions that he had not understood, he began running in the direction of the house with his heart beating with excitement at the presentiment ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... 'that it must have been a presentiment which made you all take such a fancy to that quaint old house, even though you only saw it ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... Ezekiel, and in these discourses he said much that bore on the conflict with Rome, now daily growing more virulent. He inveighed against the temporal wealth of the Church and launched many accusations against Rome. The impression produced was the deeper because of the general presentiment in men's minds of the coming uprising of Christendom ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... the heart of the anxious wife. It was soon ascertained that Marvel had been a passenger on board of this vessel; but, from some cause, nothing in regard to him beyond this fact could she learn. Against all persuasion, she started for the hospital, her heart oppressed with a fearful presentiment that he was either dead or struggling in the grasp of a fatal malady. On making inquiry at the hospital, she was told the one she sought was not there, and she was about returning to the city, when ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... countenance; and this, too, I put down for an assumption of disguise on the part of the prince. It was natural enough; with his conspicuous rank, he could only venture to be unguarded in his attentions to those for whom he had no presentiment of ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... and the thunder of hands and feet and sticks, and the flutter of handkerchiefs, with men precipitating themselves to kiss his hand, and others weeping and embracing, be sure that no private ambition possesses him, be sure that his heart swells only with the presentiment of great events and with uplifting thoughts of the millions who will thrill to the distant echo ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... as he fared slowly against the wind's blustering, with his eyes on the ground, and his movements seemingly guided more by the weight of the bundle he carried than by his own will. Before he came within even loud shouting distance, everybody felt a presentiment of disaster; but he had not spoken a word to justify or discredit it by the time he ...
— Strangers at Lisconnel • Barlow Jane
... this, and would have the whole story with every detail. I even found myself confessing my old presentiment, the fancy that Monica was calling for me ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... wonderful presentiment of the future," replied the chaplain; "and all that you ought either to do or to leave undone is faithfully mirrored in various ways in her mind, during a half-waking trance. Now she knows of your deep sorrow, and she sends me, ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... passage to that place in one of the Chinese boats, twenty of them agreed to go there immediately, in hopes of getting a passage from thence to England. Mr Taylor, one of the mates of the Success, was of the number: But before the boat set sail, he had some presentiment of danger, and chose rather to lose his money, by waiting for another opportunity. He had reason to be satisfied with himself for this conduct; as he soon learnt that the boat tad been taken by ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... creature here was painful to behold. I spoke soothingly and encouragingly, but with a presentiment that she must be disappointed. While I was speaking the supper-bell rang, and I proposed to get her ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... soul, I've no notion of laughing at you! Your presentiment may be the real thing,—for all I know. Anyway, if you want to ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... Dulcie, a thin forlorn widow woman, talked with a lingering echo of his elevation, of her Will's being beyond lamentation, and of herself and her boy's being well off with their faith in the future. Dulcie had a proud, constant presentiment in the recesses of her woman's heart that the husband and father's good name and merited reputation would surely find his memory out in this world yet. She had no material possessions save a few of his gorgeous, gruesome, hieroglyphical pictures, and what she had borrowed ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... of her years. At twelve she could outdo me by the logic of her reasoning on the mysteries of religion. We both adore, my dear Jean, a very extraordinary little person. I will get out of your way gracefully, if you succeed; but I have a presentiment that neither you nor I will be the lucky fellow. I shall console ...
— The Idol of Paris • Sarah Bernhardt
... just what, but some sudden presentiment—prompted him to step quickly through the passage in order to make sure that he had entered the right room. ...
— Tom Slade with the Colors • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... "had I never departed from virtue, I might at this moment have held in your heart the envied place of Miss Somerville; but as the righteous decrees of Providence having provided punishment to tread fast in the footsteps of guilt, I am now expiating my faults, and I have a presentiment that although the struggle is bitter, it will soon be over. God's will be done; and may you, my dear Frank, have many, many happy years in the society of one you are bound to ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... Hygelac and his son Heardred. He rules prosperously for fifty years, till a dragon, brooding over a hidden treasure, begins to ravage the country, and destroys Bewulf's palace with fire. Bewulf sets out in quest of its hiding-place, with twelve men. Having a presentiment of his approaching end, he pauses and recalls to mind his past life and exploits. He then takes leave of his followers, one by one, and advances alone to attack the dragon. Unable, from the heat, to enter the cavern, ...
— Beowulf • James A. Harrison and Robert Sharp, eds.
... season for their own visit to her brother; while she wrote to Eugene, excusing their absence, and begging him not to come to see her at present. It is true, all this was but putting off the evil day; but she had a presentiment of mischief, and did not know what to do to avert it; the rather that she was aware both her father and brother wished to see her married to the count, and that neither of them would consent to her union with ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... on being told that the figures she had beheld in the vision were thought to be those of her ancestors, she was not so much surprised as I expected, but said that she had had a presentiment all along that the tragedies she had witnessed were in some way connected with her ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... head. As he came forward his eyes fell upon the group, silent and motionless, under the engine house. The men had drawn down their hats and turned up their collars to screen their faces. For a moment the presentiment of Death laid its cold hand upon the manager's heart. At the next he had shaken it off and saw only ...
— The Valley of Fear • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... possible that the Emperor had a presentiment of some kind that his life was now in danger, and that the presentiment may have attuned his thoughts to meditation on Christ's life and teaching; for it is a fact, well worthy of remark, that in the fear of death man's one and only relief and consolation is the knowledge ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... berries, and can hardly forbear to rush upon them. And the Indians, coming from their distant wigwams to view the white man's settlement, marvel at the deep track which he makes, and perhaps are saddened by a flitting presentiment that this heavy tread will find its way over all the land; and that the wild-woods, the wild wolf, and the wild Indian will alike be trampled beneath it. Even so shall it be. The pavements of the Main Street must be laid over ...
— Main Street - (From: "The Snow Image and Other Twice-Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... master, who appeared to be unusually grave (as if in sad presentiment of evil). "I've watched him often.—But it's ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... strangely about it. There was a presentiment in his heart that he did not dare to shake off. It seemed as if this conflict were one that would threaten the happiness of his whole life. He still kept his old feeling of attraction to Raoul, the memory of the many happy days they had spent together; and ...
— The Ruling Passion • Henry van Dyke
... glass our soldiers saw The base-ball bounding sent; They could have joined them in their sport But for the vale's deep rent. And others turned the reddish soil, Like diggers of graves they bent: The reddish soil and tranching toil Begat presentiment. ...
— Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War • Herman Melville
... boy's soul, and he lived till his seventeenth birthday and beyond it without further trouble. If he had known that he would be in his seventeenth year as soon as he was sixteen, he might have arranged his presentiment differently. ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells
... Jerusalem, the multitude protected him by day, and he escaped by night. His answers, made to several questions at this time, for example, John viii. 3, are still admired. He had always suspected Judas; and as he had a presentiment that he would come to a bad end, he became very uneasy, and yet was able to exhort his disciples. He did not really die on the cross. Whenever recognized by his disciples afterwards, he went away directly, and came back unexpectedly and for a short time. At last he ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... of the queen, Marie Antoinette, had plunged me, too, into deepest sadness. Solange was all tears, and we could not rid ourselves of a strange feeling of despondency, a presentiment of approaching danger, that compressed our hearts. In vain I tried to whisper courage to Solange. Weeping, she reclined in my arms, and I could not comfort her, because my own words ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... where there is habitual rebellion against Him, or profound far-spreading social depravity, still the undercurrent, or the heroic outburst, of natural virtue, as well as the yearnings of the heart after what it has not, and its presentiment of its true remedies, are to be ascribed to the Author of all good. Anticipations or reminiscences of His glory haunt the mind of the self-sufficient sage, and of the pagan devotee; His writing is upon the wall, whether of the Indian fane, or of the porticoes of Greece. He introduces ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman
... me very stupid," resumed the old lady after a slight pause, her face grown grave again, "but for weeks past, even before this happened, I've had such an odd sense of insecurity, a presentiment of trouble. I'm not given to feelings of that kind, which makes this one more noticeable. I can't explain it, but there it is—a kind of foreboding that I can't ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... lover, but could trace no emotion in his features; they were composed. The present feelings of Gomez Arias partook of no alarm, and the unfortunate Theodora felt a fearful presentiment, as she perceived the unmoved expression of his countenance; for though the bravery of her lover might not allow him to dread the approach of death, for his own sake, yet, surely, her own danger ought to ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... Verdant, however, had a presentiment that the play would soon become earnest; but he seated himself in the saddle (after a short delirious dance on one toe), and in a state of extreme agitation, not to say perspiration, proceeded at a walk, by Mr. Larkyns' side, up Holywell Street. Here the mare, ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... lodged in Constantinople by Justinian, and by him replaced, from superstitious motives, in Jerusalem. From that time its history is lost." —Merivale.] Carthage, through her own barbarian conquerors, was at last avenged upon her hated rival. The mournful presentiment of Scipio had fallen true (see p. 271). The cruel fate of Carthage might have been read again in the pillaged city that ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... sitting opposite him, she felt herself getting daft, and longed to rush away and to escape into the open country in order to avoid that mute, eternal companionship and also some vague danger, which she could not define, but of which she had a presentiment. ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... from M. Davennes the role of Dolores, the chief part in Bouilhet's play. I knew that Favart, who should have had this role, was not well; but there were other artistes, and I could not get over my joy and surprise. Nevertheless, I felt somewhat uneasy. A terrible presentiment has always warned me of any troubles about to come ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... you," replied Mrs. Weldon; "but I have, as it were, a presentiment that the tempest is going down or is going ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... few journals. A sudden desire seized him, as if he had a presentiment of what it contained, to cast this one into the fire without reading it. For a moment he held it in his fingers ready to throw it into the grate. Then a few words read by accident invincibly ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... craven heart wilted before his savage judge; while his mind was racked with tortures of suspense, and his scheming brain had lost its power of concentration; while his limbs shook at the presentiment of his doom, his woman stood fearless at his side, ready to serve him to the bitter end, ready to sacrifice herself if need be that his wretched life might ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... tell her? Could I confess to the gloomy presentiment that overshadowed me? Could I make myself intelligible to ...
— Somebody's Luggage • Charles Dickens
... standing like dewdrops on the outer earth; as I glance at that bosom, whereon the sun's rays are finding a roseate reflection, as though the blood were oozing through the skin, my rapture dies away, and turns to sorrow, heartache, and tears. For in me there is a presentiment that before the living juice within that bosom shall have borne fruit, it will have ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... the hand of his daughter and placed it within that of the bridegroom, almost shuddering with a vague presentiment of evil, when he felt, even through her kid glove, how deadly cold and heavy ...
— Her Mother's Secret • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... of her dependants, some such shadow seemed to have fallen on the Lady Winifred. An unaccountable presentiment of evil weighed upon her spirits. She could not leave her husband one moment while he was yet spared to her; ever and anon she was surprised into tender words of endearment, foreign to the general tenor of her daily life, which partook of the ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... either so small, or the hive so destitute of supplies, that they are discouraged or driven to desperation. I once knew a colony to leave the hive under such circumstances, on a springlike day in December! They seem to have a presentiment that they must perish if they stay, and instead of awaiting the sure approach of famine, they sally out to see if something cannot be done to ...
— Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey-Bee - A Bee Keeper's Manual • L. L. Langstroth
... was the sudden fate of the man who had returned to England from wandering alone within a stone's throw of the Matabele bivouac fires unknown and unhonoured by the public. I wonder if Baden-Powell had a presentiment of what was to be when, in the early days of the siege, he corrected the proofs of Aids to Scouting, and came upon his own words towards the end of that manual: "Remember always that you are helping your side to win, and not merely getting glory for yourself or your ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... thoroughly grasp Greek culture, then, we see that it is all over with it. The philologist is thus a great sceptic in the present conditions of our culture and training . that is his mission. Happy is he if, like Wagner and Schopenhauer, he has a dim presentiment of those auspicious powers amid which a new culture ...
— We Philologists, Volume 8 (of 18) • Friedrich Nietzsche
... a presentiment that the husband would call at those chambers while she was there. And he did. Ginevra, you remember his knock upon the door. ...
— Alice Sit-By-The-Fire • J. M. Barrie
... sure concerning this doctrine, and not doubt, for otherwise all is lost, and the Pope and devil and all things gain the victory and suit over us." (461, 5.) Martin Chemnitz remarks: "I frequently shudder, because Luther—I do not know by what kind of presentiment—in his commentaries on the Letter to the Galatians and on the First Book of Moses so often repeats the statement: 'This doctrine [of justification] will be obscured again after my death.'" (Walther, ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... I could only repeat anew the one inexhaustible feeling of our original harmony. A great future beckons me on into the immeasurable; each idea develops a countless progeny. The extremes of unbridled gayety and of quiet presentiment live together within me. I remember everything, even the griefs, and all my thoughts that have been and are to be bestir themselves and arise before me. The blood rushes wildly through my swollen veins, my mouth thirsts for the contact of your ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... again? When would he recognize her? What would he do? What could she do? Would Kells be a devil or a man at the end? Was there any justification of her haunting fear of Gulden—of her suspicion that she alone was the cause of his attitude toward Kells—of her horror at the unshakable presentiment and fancy that he was a gorilla and meant to make off with her? These, and a thousand other fears, some groundless, but many real and present, besieged Joan and left her little ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... virtually yielded to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Perhaps Becket felt that his mission was accomplished; that he had done the work for which he was raised up. Wearied, sickened with the world, disgusted with the Pope, despising his bishops, perhaps he was willing to die. He had a presentiment that he should die as a martyr. So had the French king and his prelates. But Becket longed to return to his church and celebrate the festivities of Christmas. So he made up his mind to return to England, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume V • John Lord
... cotton, with a prayerful heart, and a watchful eye on Wilson. From Wilson's actions Ben was sure something was going to occur which would nearly concern him, and having been hunted like a beast he had become suspicious and on his guard all the time. Having a feeling of presentiment, he was uneasy, and, as was usual with him, he kneeled down and asked God to protect him from the machinations of his enemies, and give him heart, courage, and strength to overcome the evil intended him. While praying he ...
— Biography of a Slave - Being the Experiences of Rev. Charles Thompson • Charles Thompson
... And what was it? The Imitation in Greek, by a certain George Mayr, S. J. Wasn't this nice? My pet book done into my favorite language! It was the happiest Christmas I ever spent. Quam bonus Israel Deus! So too said Father Letheby. But I had some dim presentiment that all his well-merited pleasure would not be quite unalloyed,—that some secret hand, perhaps a merciful one, would pluck a laurel leaf or two from his crown. We had a pleasant academic discussion after dinner about the honorable retention of ancient Irish customs,—he ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... stillness that tells of intense mental engrossment. Self-deception was impossible for her; her mind was too acute for tolerance of subterfuge; and for her, also, away and beyond the merciless findings of intellect was the besetment of presentiment, intuition, inward convictions that can override logical conclusions, words that are breathed in the soul as by a wind, and, like the wind, are born and die ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... sigh, "Thank you, Elizabeth; but now that we have won the position, I almost wish it were otherwise. Poor Mr. Lincoln is looking so broken-hearted, so completely worn out, I fear he will not get through the next four years." Was it a presentiment that made her take a sad view of the future? News from the front was never more cheering. On every side the Confederates were losing ground, and the lines of blue were advancing in triumph. As I would look out my window almost every day, I could see the artillery going past on ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley
... she replied. "You fell in love with a nun. You were imprisoned under the Leads, and I heard of your almost miraculous flight at Vienna. I had a false presentiment that I should see you in that town. Afterwards I heard of you in Paris and Holland, but after you left Paris nobody could tell me any more about you. You will hear some fine tales when I tell you all that has happened to me during the past ten years. Now I am happy. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... Cannitz, you are doing me a service instead. I am restless to-night. I have a curious presentiment that before long these lovely hills will hear the roar of guns in earnest." Dreamily speaking as if to himself he continued, "And Russia will lose . . . but I shall not see it." Abruptly he looked up, sat erect in his chair and shook himself as if ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... to be his last trip for the year, the following spring was fixed for their marriage; and when he took his leave, it was with the gloomy presentiment that he had a dreary ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... mysteries. We are surrounded by an atmosphere of which we do not know what is stirring in it, or how it is connected with our own spirit. So much is certain—that in particular cases we can put out the feelers of our soul beyond its bodily limits, and that a presentiment, nay, an actual insight into, the immediate future is accorded ...
— Real Ghost Stories • William T. Stead
... when the Emperor Julian made his first entry into Antioch, he found in like manner the gay, the luxurious capital of the East plunged in mimic grief for the annual death of Adonis; and if he had any presentiment of coming evil, the voices of lamentation which struck upon his ear must have seemed ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... roused from his revery and for a long time contemplated the quiet, thoughtful lad who sat beside him. Gradually a deep concern spread across his comfortably aged features, a presentiment of impending loss shadowed his pleasant eyes. He reached out to lay his ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... my soul," whispered uncle Ro, "that my dear old mother has a secret presentiment who we are, by her manifesting so much respect.—T'ousand t'anks, matam, t'ousand t'anks," he continued, dropping into his half-accurate half-blundering broken English, "for dis great honour, such as we might not ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper
... benediction, which was received by the kneeling communicants, to the astonishment of D'Artagnan, who recognized in the priest the coadjutor* himself, the famous Jean Francois Gondy, who at that time, having a presentiment of the part he was to play, was beginning to court popularity by almsgiving. It was to this end that he performed from time to time some of those early masses which the common ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... having caught sight of Desroches in the act of being brought by Mademoiselle Thuillier into the garden; he went, driven by a terrible and glacial presentiment, to meet him. ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... interested in the following additional instance of composing with a visual object in mind: "I wrote to you concerning a presentiment; it occurred to me on the days from March 24th to 27th, when I was at work on my new composition. There is a place in it to which I constantly recurred; it is as if some one sighed, 'Ach, Gott!' from the bottom of his heart. While composing, I constantly ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... liberty. But the promise was ill kept; and her Majesty showed displeasure at being reminded of it. At length Frances was informed that in a fortnight her attendance should Cease. "I heard this," she says, "with a fearful presentiment I should surely never go through another fortnight in so weak and languishing and painful a state of health. . . . As the time of separation approached, the queen's cordiality rather diminished, and traces of internal displeasure appeared ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... you nor I can think of; therefore, I say again, moderate your expectations, and do not depend too much on Hassan's success; for to tell you what I think, and what I always thought (whether you like to hear it or not), I have a secret presentiment that you will not have accomplished your purpose, and that I shall succeed better in proving that a poor man may sooner become rich by other means ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... presentiment, then, was true—I had found him after so long a time! But what if he should not see me? What torment to be so near and yet so far! And how was it likely he would take notice of a common private's watch, and if he did, how was it likely at this distance of time he would remember ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed
... politics. Lady Burlesdon utterly despairs of me; my neighbours think me an indolent, dreamy, unsociable fellow. Yet I am a young man; and sometimes I have a fancy—the superstitious would call it a presentiment—that my part in life is not yet altogether played; that, somehow and some day, I shall mix again in great affairs, I shall again spin policies in a busy brain, match my wits against my enemies', brace my muscles to fight a good fight and strike stout blows. Such is the tissue ...
— The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... fire. There had been nothing very remarkable in the observation made by the man to whom he had addressed himself, but he was in a peculiar state of mind, that gave undue importance to every word, sounding, as it did, a vague presentiment of some coming evil, which the very singular manner of the dog had created, although he would scarcely acknowledge this ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... another. For the intense yearning which each of them has towards the other does not appear to be the desire of lover's intercourse, but of something else which the soul of either evidently desires and cannot tell, and of which she has only a dark and doubtful presentiment. Suppose Hephaestus, with his instruments, to come to the pair who are lying side by side and to say to them, 'What do you people want of one another?' they would be unable to explain. And suppose further, that when he saw ...
— Symposium • Plato
... but a sign, a presentiment of an art, that may grow from the present seeds, that may rise into some stately and unpremeditated efflorescence, as the rhapsodist rose to Sophocles, as the miracle play rose through Peele and Nash to Marlowe, hence to the wondrous summer of Shakespeare, to die ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... life strangely inconsistent in a land which to me stood for all that was highest and most beautiful. A curious thought came to me. I wondered if the man who framed that edict had a vision of what foreign teachings might bring in its trail? Possibly some presentiment haunted him of the great danger that would come to his people through contact with a country leagues removed in customs and beliefs. Neither crucifixion nor torture had availed to keep out the new religion. With it came wisdom and great reforms. Misinterpretation too, had followed. Old ...
— The House of the Misty Star - A Romance of Youth and Hope and Love in Old Japan • Fannie Caldwell Macaulay
... might abandon the vessel and so escape any risk," observed the merchant—not in a tone as if he intended to do so. "You, at all events, Mr Braithwaite, can be landed, and you can easily get back to Batavia." Against this proposal of course my manhood rebelled, though I had a presentiment, if I may use the expression, that we should be attacked. "No, no! I will stay by you and share your fate, whatever that may be," I replied. Night came on, and darkness hid all distant objects ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... strong presentiment that (bating some out of the way accident) you will survive me. The difference of eight years, or whatever it is, between our ages, is nothing. I do not feel (nor am, indeed, anxious to feel) the principle of life ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron
... strawberries.) You underrate him, I think: he was downright handsome. When Molly Bawn was in short petticoats he used to adore her. I suppose it would be presumptuous to pretend to measure the admiration he will undoubtedly feel for her now. I have a presentiment that fortune is going to favor you in the end, Molly. He ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... when I left Kabul, was to ride as far as the Khyber Pass, but suddenly a presentiment, which I have never been able to explain to myself, made me retrace my steps and hurry back towards Kabul—a presentiment of coming trouble which I can only ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... Brandywine, a leg that had been somewhat rudely handled, but since that time it has quite recovered, and my left leg is now almost as strong as the other one. This is the only scratch I have received, or ever shall receive, I can safely promise you, my love. I had a presentiment that I should be wounded at the first affair, and I have now a presentiment that I shall not be wounded again. I wrote to you after our success at Monmouth, and I scrawled my letter almost on the field of battle, and still surrounded with slashed faces. Since that period, the only events that ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... said, 'what does your amiable forgiveness matter? What are your poor little wrongs, in the reckoning for greater wrongs which is demanded of me? I am not trying to frighten you, I am only miserable about myself. Do you know what it is to have a firm presentiment of calamity that is coming to you—and yet to hope that your own positive conviction will not prove true? When I first met you, before my marriage, and first felt your influence over me, I had that hope. It was a starveling sort ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins
... other people's, have deceived me often enough; but I am almost afraid that my presentiment of last night was really prophetic, ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... "As it happened, my wife had some sort of presentiment, and the jewels are in two canvas pouches securely fastened under her clothing. She leaped overboard ...
— The Submarine Boys' Trial Trip - "Making Good" as Young Experts • Victor G. Durham
... few steps towards the door of the room. At this moment Gillette and Nicolas Poussin reached the entrance of the house. As the young girl was about to enter, she dropped the arm of her lover and shrank back as if overcome by a presentiment. "What am I doing here?" she said to Poussin, in a deep ...
— The Hidden Masterpiece • Honore de Balzac
... funeral that ever was, except that they don't crawl along the way a funeral does. I'm glad of that, anyhow. I wish I didn't FEEL so much as if I was goin' to be buried. I don't know why I do. I hope it isn't a presentiment." ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... road beyond it, his head bent as if he were pondering a pain. At moments he felt as if he must return at once, and refuse to leave the castle for any reason. But he could not see that it was the will of God he should do so. A presentiment is not a command. A prophecy may fail of the least indication of duty. Hamlet defying augury is the consistent religious man Shakspere takes pains to show him. A presentiment may be true, may be from God himself, yet involve ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... Harrison Gray Otis thought to puncture the Southern panic. But the slaveholders had correcter notions of the nature and tendency of the Abolition enterprise than had the Boston mayor. They had a strange, an obstinate presentiment of disaster from the first instant that the Liberator loomed upon their horizon. It was a battery whose guns, unless silenced, would play havoc with Southern interests and the slave system; ergo, the paper must be suppressed; ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... the king ordered his carriage, to go and see how the preparations for the 16th of May—the day of the public entrance into the capital of the newly-crowned Queen of France—were progressing. It is said that he had a superstitious presentiment concerning carriages, and but very seldom used them; there were not wanting other warnings, one from the astrologers, and his heart was unusually heavy. He had already escaped nineteen attempts at assassination. The coaches of those days had no glass windows, and ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton
... his voice attracted the mother's attention. A presentiment quickened the beating of her heart; the fan ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... might be imagination, but suddenly the sounds increased, and once or twice footsteps hurried past the dungeon. The noise now woke Melton, and together they listened, convinced that it was a presentiment of coming evil. The strange sounds rose and fell, at times nearly dying away and then bursting out with ...
— The River of Darkness - Under Africa • William Murray Graydon
... didna. I kept sayin' I thocht he would be a lassie because I was fleid he would be; but a' the time I had a presentiment he would be a laddie. It was wi' Joey deein' sae sudden, an' I took on sae terrible aboot 'im 'at I thocht all alang the Lord would gie ...
— A Window in Thrums • J. M. Barrie
... had been going on in the library of Eccleston Square, Tom Dimsdale was still wending his way homewards with a feeling of weight in his mind and a presentiment of misfortune which overshadowed his whole soul. In vain he assured himself that this disappearance of Kate's was but temporary, and that the rumour of an engagement between her and Ezra was too ridiculous ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... out. When D'Artagnan, as he entered the shop of the Pilon d'Or, announced to Planchet that M. du Vallon would be one of the privileged travelers, and as the plume in Porthos's hat made the wooden candles suspended over the front jingle together, a melancholy presentiment seemed to eclipse the delight Planchet had promised himself for the morrow. But the grocer had a heart of gold, ever mindful of the good old times—a trait that carries youth into old age. So Planchet, notwithstanding a sort of internal shiver, checked as ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... we have no evidence at all, merely a sort of 'hunch', or presentiment, of a plot against the peace and welfare of the Federated Planets. There may be nothing wrong at all, but we don't like to take chances. With your ability to read minds you may be able to find out. We ...
— Man of Many Minds • E. Everett Evans
... man, earnestly, "your coming promises so much to us all! You were just the one element lacking in our home. I now see that it was so. I already have the presentiment that you will do more for us than ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... between fun and fear—vague, unaccountable fear, that hung over her like a cloud, darkening her bright frolic spirit with a woeful presentiment. ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... can it be?" Suddenly Houston frowned with presentiment. "Thayer's been going with Medaine a ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... their way inside. On entering the palace they proceeded to the room of the Prince, arresting on their way thither M. L——[169] and two officers of the body-guard. Before they forced the door the Prince, it seems, had a presentiment of some danger, and cried from within, 'Don't enter, for I shall fire.' Before the sentence was finished, however, the door was burst open, and he saw before him the conspirators with revolvers in their hands. He was cowardly enough (says the narrative) not to fire once. It ...
— Roumania Past and Present • James Samuelson
... throng of saints. Hilda wondered if it were not possible, by some miracle of faith, so to rise above her present despondency that she might look down upon what she was, just as Petronilla in the picture looked at her own corpse. A hope, born of hysteric trouble, fluttered in her heart. A presentiment, or what she fancied such, whispered her, that, before she had finished the circuit of ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume II. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... was in vain. Maston was seized with a sinister presentiment. He observed Captain Nicholl closely, asking himself if, once the captain's vengeance satisfied, the unfortunate Barbicane had not been left lying in some bloody thicket. Michel Ardan seemed to have the same thought, and they were ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne
... meanwhile, however, he strove, as he went along, to persuade himself that the presentiment was but the work of fancy; that there was nothing real in it; that he had excited himself to fears and apprehensions that were groundless; that the expedition of the Earl to Italy was but a temporary undertaking, and that it would most probably make no change in his situation, ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... a moment, but averted her face still further from him. At last she said, in a low tone: "Mr. Van Berg, did you ever have a presentiment of evil?" ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... away from the house along a path leading to the main road. He was thinking seriously of what Lois had told him about Bramshaw. He could not understand her strange aversion for the man, and he wondered if there were really anything in such a presentiment. He made up his mind that he would be on the lookout and if the fellow became the least objectionable he would deal with him then in ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... by a waterfall in the leafless April woods, I discovered a swarm in the top of a large hickory. I had the season before remarked the tree as a likely place for bees, but the screen of leaves concealed them from me. This time my former presentiment occurred to me, and, looking sharply, sure enough there were the bees, going out and in a large, irregular opening. In June a violent tempest of wind and rain demolished the tree, and the honey was all lost in the creek into ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs
... divulged caused a presentiment of great peril. When left alone with his young favorite, and suddenly overwhelmed, amidst his army, with cares and business of which his minister usually relieved him, the king had too much wit not to perceive the frivolous insignificance of Cinq-Mars compared ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... the Marquis, 'I always had a presentiment that Emily's government would come to a ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge
... home became a rendezvous for the Delegated meetings of the United Societies. This thickened the dangers that were gathering around his life. He had a presentiment that his blood would be shed for the cause of Christ, yet he accepted duty at every hazard, and rejoiced in privileges ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters
... Nature's forces to man, machinery, application of chemistry to industry and agriculture, steam-navigation, railways, electric telegraphs, clearing of whole continents for cultivation, canalisation of rivers, whole populations conjured out of the ground—what earlier century had even a presentiment that such productive forces slumbered in the ...
— The Communist Manifesto • Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
... coupled, in all nations, with some superstitious presentiment or terror,—some connection between the material frame and the supposed world without us?" asked the stranger. "For my part, ...
— Zicci, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... presentiment, O Mother, lies On thy waste brow and sadly-folded lips, Forefeeling the Light's terrible eclipse On Calvary, as if love made thee wise, And thou couldst read in those dear infant eyes The sorrow that beneath their smiling sleeps, And guess what ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... Field-Marshal," he repeated, "tell me whether in the night you have ever had the presentiment of ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... I never wanted to be a clergyman; but, after mother died, I began to think it over. She was so sort of sweet and changed that last year, almost as if she had a presentiment; and though she took such an interest in my studies, she never spoke of that, though I know it was her heart's desire. All the time I seem to have had a leaning towards it. It is a grand life, when one's heart and soul are in it; and I am sure now mine would be. I should feel as if I was ...
— A Little Girl of Long Ago • Amanda Millie Douglas
... Jeanne d'Arc in 1429. It was the fact that the Cardinal de Bourbon and the Due de Guise had been seen walking together at the Porte St. Honore that was said to have turned half the moustache of Henri of Navarre suddenly white, from a presentiment of the crime which has become known as the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. Here, in 1648, the barricade was raised which gave the signal for all the troubles of the Fronde. It was at No 3—then called L'Auberge des Trois ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... suddenly breaking the silence; "were you ever seized by an uncontrollable, unaccountable, irresistible presentiment of coming evil,—a feeling as if a sudden gulf of blackness and horror yawned before you—a dreadful something haunting you, you knew not what, but only knew ...
— Julian Home • Dean Frederic W. Farrar
... all was well. My father was swayed by this specious reasoning, and believing that there was more merit in going to the more dangerous post, he persisted in his intention of going to Italy, in spite of the objections of my mother, who had a secret presentiment which made her wish for my father to go to the Rhine. This presentiment was not false. She ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... from Baton Rouge tells us that my presentiment about our house is verified; Yankees do inhabit it, a Yankee colonel and his wife. They say they look strangely at home on our front gallery, pacing up and down.... And a stranger and a Yankee occupies our father's place at the table where he presided ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... her at home, and then, more like herself, she rages in the moment of his mad jealousy and her unquenchable anger. To-morrow he would submit to the final arbitrament of arms the cause for which he had lived, and for which the presentiment was upon him that he would die, and the quarrel begun between him and MacKay fifteen years ago, between the sides they represent centuries ago, would be settled. If the years had been given back to him to live again, he would not have had them otherwise. Destiny had settled for ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... went back to their own firesides and sat talking with their wives and children about the calamities of the times. Others who were younger and less prudent remained in the streets; for there seems to have been a presentiment that some strange event was on the eve ...
— Grandfather's Chair • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... to think it all out and prepare for everything. But I am certain I have forgotten something. I have a feeling amounting to a dreadful presentiment that I have overlooked something important. I wish you would see if you can think ...
— Pharaoh's Broker - Being the Very Remarkable Experiences in Another World of Isidor Werner • Ellsworth Douglass
... in advance, the sweet presentiment of revenge which he intends taking upon them. He ...
— Shakspere And Montaigne • Jacob Feis
... marriage became clearly apparent to her, she had not courage to lie to her lover and to trample her own heart underfoot. One alternative remained: to reveal the truth to the Marquis. But this would imperil all. A secret presentiment warned her if she, herself, disclosed the truth, that it would be to her that the Marquis would appeal in order to compel Philip to renounce his hopes, since it was in her power to destroy them by a single word. Day followed day, and Dolores, ...
— Which? - or, Between Two Women • Ernest Daudet
... deceived by the honest accents which long practice had taught Mascarin to use, and he had neither a suspicion nor a presentiment. ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... had premonitions. You remember the Pied Piper—but no, of course you wouldn't—you were too young. One evening long ago when Nan and Di and Jem and the Merediths and I were together in Rainbow Valley I had a queer vision or presentiment—whatever you like to call it. Rilla, I saw the Piper coming down the Valley with a shadowy host behind him. The others thought I was only pretending—but I saw him for just one moment. And Rilla, last night ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... smoking his pipe and reading the evening papers in his den at the back of the house; and the little, white-faced mother moved incessantly from room to room, no sooner settled in one place than she was seized with an anxious presentiment that she ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... through the head during the night. I was awakened about three o'clock in the morning by an explosion, and immediately sprang out of bed and rushed into the Captain's cabin to find out the cause, though with a terrible presentiment in my heart. Quickly as I went, Goring went more quickly still, for he was already in the cabin stooping over the dead body of the Captain. It was a hideous sight, for the whole front of his face was blown in, and the little room was swimming in ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... from the first moment, before a word is spoken. Such was the impression made on Raskolnikov by the person sitting a little distance from him, who looked like a retired clerk. The young man often recalled this impression afterwards, and even ascribed it to presentiment. He looked repeatedly at the clerk, partly no doubt because the latter was staring persistently at him, obviously anxious to enter into conversation. At the other persons in the room, including the tavern-keeper, the clerk looked as though ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... the secret of a resistance pushed to extremities had not been discovered; nevertheless even in 1797 his boldness might have led to a negative result if, as already said, he had not with a sort of presentiment avoided it by signing the ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... expecting it. From the very moment those ill-judged words had passed the fellow's lips, I had had a presentiment that a determined effort would be made to elect me as the goat, and I braced ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... whether wrung, perforce, from a proudly humble, or freely offered by a simply magnanimous, heart—when, like John the Baptist speaking of Jesus, Bourdaloue, growing old, said of Massillon, enjoying his swiftly crescent renown: "He must increase, and I must decrease." It was a true presentiment of the comparative fortune of fame that impended for these two men. It was not, however, in the same path, but in a different, that Massillon outran Bourdaloue. In his own sphere, that of unimpassioned appeal to reason and to conscience, Bourdaloue is still without ...
— Classic French Course in English • William Cleaver Wilkinson
... of his name and face, being warned by a presentiment which I could not resist that I should ...
— The International Spy - Being the Secret History of the Russo-Japanese War • Allen Upward
... which were very remarkable, and I was convinced, at the time, that the dead gave these messages to her. She personally could not account for them. I probably owe my life to one of my mother's premonitions. I was going on a steamboat excursion with my school friends, when my mother had a strong presentiment of danger, and begged me not to go. She gave in to my entreaties, however, much against her will. Just as the boat was about to leave the pier, a vision of her pale face and tear-filled eyes came to me. I heard her voice repeating, "I wish you would not go, Davy." The influence was so strong that ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm • David Belasco |
