"Compassion" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... it differently, why should any one expend compassion on a man, as if he were a beggar, who has it in his power to satisfy by just and honest means his every need? (19) Surely it would be more appropriate to call that man a wretched starveling beggar rather, who through lack of means is driven to live by ugly shifts ...
— Hiero • Xenophon
... would always prove to me delicious, and that your love would never die. In this world nothing endures. My fond attachment has ceased to have any charm for you, and my heart is filled with dismay. This trial has come from God; of this my reason and my faith are convinced. God has felt compassion for my unspeakable grief. That which for long past I have suffered is greater than human force can bear; He is going to receive me into His home of mercy. He promises ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... have thrilled Elenko with rapture, if this had not been checked by awe at her own presumption. The idea that a Deity, other than some disgraced offender like Prometheus, could be the object of her compassion, would never have entered her mind. And now she pitied the whole Olympian cohort most sincerely, not so much for having fallen as for having deserved to fall. She could not conceal from herself how grievously they were one and all behind the age. It was impossible to make Zeus comprehend ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... boundless in their expenditures, reckless as to the mode of gaining wherewithal to support them, oppressive and despotical to their inferiors, smooth-tongued and hypocritical toward each other, destitute equally of justice and compassion toward men, and of respect and piety toward the Gods! Wealth had become the idol, the god of the whole people! Wealth—and no longer service, eloquence, daring, or integrity,—was held the requisite for office. Wealth now conferred upon its owner, all magistracies all guerdons—rank, power, command,—consulships, ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... corresponding wane of the mind. Of this I am as yet sensible sufficiently to be unwilling to trust myself before the public, and when I cease to be so, I hope that my friends will be too careful of me to draw me forth and present me, like a Priam in armor, as a spectacle for public compassion. I hope our political bark will ride through all its dangers; but I can in future be ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... of this reign—that of the Lady Jane Grey, who had been reprieved three months before. The queen urged the plea of self-defence, and the safety of the realm—the same that Queen Elizabeth, in after times, made in reference to the Queen of the Scots. Her unfortunate fate excited great popular compassion, and she suffered with a martyr's constancy, and also her husband—two illustrious victims, sacrificed in consequence of the ambition of their relatives, and the jealousy of the queen. The Duke of Suffolk, the father of Lady Jane, was also executed, ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... his road amid the carcasses of the dead strewed in the way, called for the keys of the prisons, and with his own hands released the captives there, and, clapping them on the shoulders as they came down stairs, exclaimed, "brother soldiers, you are free."[338] Unfortunately his compassion was of a party nature, and was only aroused for his ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... the strange damsel's song, which had made such deep impression on his imagination, that he could not prevent himself from imitating it repeatedly in the course of his examination. The Abbot had compassion with the Sacristan's involuntary frailty, to which something supernatural seemed annexed, and finally became of opinion, that Father Eustace's more natural explanation was rather plausible than just. And, indeed, although we have recorded the adventure ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... went to seek his fortune in Paris, and found there nothing but misery. He wrote to me acknowledging his error. My compassion was excited by the recollection of our former friendship, and I sent him a sum of money. The year following, as I passed through Paris, I saw him much in the same situation; but he was the intimate friend of M. de Laliand, and I could ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... a pause, in which he had really glanced over the paper. "Poor boys! It goes to my heart to think what fine fellows were lost there, but compassion for them cannot soften me towards the man who practised on their generous, unsuspecting youth. I am quite aware that Prometesky saved life at the fire, and his punishment was commuted on that account, contrary ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... seeking to cross the brook and coming to grief; the dust-pan and broom quarreling and fighting on the stairs. Thus the mirror, when interrogated, shows the image of the fairest lady, and even drops of blood begin to utter obscure and fearful words of the deepest compassion. And this is the reason why our life in childhood is so infinitely significant, for then all things are of the same importance, nothing escapes our attention, there is equality in every impression; while, when more advanced in years, we must act with design, busy ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... ancestral elm, looking as though she were about to cry, and entitled "A Gambler's Wife." Mrs. Pethel was not like that. Of her there were no engravings for undergraduate hearts to melt at. But there was one man, certainly, whose compassion was very much at her service. How was he ...
— James Pethel • Max Beerbohm
... profoundly, but we are also interested in him as the subject of an experiment in analytical psychology. We do not care so much for his emotions as for the strange phantoms which are raised in his intellect by the disturbance of his natural functions. The man is placed upon the rack, but our compassion is aroused, not by feeling our own nerves and sinews twitching in sympathy, but by remarking the strange confusion of ideas produced in his mind, the singularly distorted aspect of things in general introduced by such an ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... his lodgings now, in case Heron sent his spies back to her door, and since he meant to consult with his chief. She had a vague hope that if the mysterious hero was indeed the noble-hearted man whom Armand represented him to be, surely he would take compassion on the anxiety of a sorrowing woman, and release the ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... man. "He must be in a pretty bad way, for sure!" He knelt, compassion gentling his heart, and put one hand to the insentient face. A warm sweat moistened his fingers; his palm was fanned ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... and spoke to the king who sat on the throne, and the old king heard words like 'mad,' 'age,' 'compassion.' Then the king on the throne called him to come forward, and, as he went, he caught sight of himself reflected in the polished steel shield of the bodyguard, and started back in horror! He was old, decrepit, dirty, and ragged! His ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... had been listening to Jesus as He talked to the crowd. He had seen those wonderful eyes melting with compassion. His own eyes had feasted upon that majestic countenance, and his ears had tingled, and his boyish heart thrilled with the marvellous words which fell from the Master's lips. "Surely," he had thought, ...
— "Say Fellows—" - Fifty Practical Talks with Boys on Life's Big Issues • Wade C. Smith
... patient, and she had a kind word for every one of them, Belgian, French, or even German, for we had a few Germans. There was something deeply touching in the scene. The dimly lit ward, with its crude furniture, the slim figure in black, bending in compassion over the rough fellows who would gladly have given their lives for her, and who now lay wounded in the cause in which she herself had suffered. The Germans may destroy Belgium, but they will never destroy the kingdom of its Queen. Sometimes ...
— A Surgeon in Belgium • Henry Sessions Souttar
... found his wife's clothes on fire, and she just expiring."—New-York Observer. "To present ye holy, unblameable, and unreproveable in his sight."—Barclay's Works, i, 353. "Let the distributer do his duty with simplicity; the superintendent, with diligence; he who performs offices of compassion, with cheerfulness."—Stuart's Romans, xii, 9. "If the crew rail at the master of the vessel, who will they mind?"—Collier's Antoninus, p. 106. "He having none but them, they having none but ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... went from his character into his legislation; his relentless severity and his tender sympathy both appear in it. He knows no mercy toward the transgressor, but toward the unfortunate he is full of compassion. His law says, "Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, burning for burning, stripe for stripe." But it also says, "Ye shall neither vex a stranger, nor oppress him, for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. Ye shall not afflict any widow or fatherless child." "If thou lend money to any ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... a carved figure, his eyes glowing upon the girl, blue and radiant with tenderness and compassion ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... thereat, he not knowing how far the allowance of any love-passages between two such strangely assorted suitors might tally with his duty towards the King and Government. Nor could he shut his eyes to the fact that the Prisoner regarded Mrs. Greenville first with a tender compassion (such as a father might have towards his child), next with an ardent sympathy, and finally—and that very speedily too—with a Feeling that had all the Signs and Portents of Love. These two unfortunate People were so shut out from the world, and so spiritually wedded ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... all; mingled pity and repugnance, truth and compassion strove within the maiden as well as the strange influence of those extraordinary eyes. She was almost as much afraid of herself as of her suitor. At last she managed to say, "I am very sorry for you; I grieve from my heart for your troubles; I should be very glad to hear ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... advance along the shore. I quickened pace. On reaching the beach, I found the new-comer standing out about a hundred yards. The man at the helm appeared to regard me with some interest. With a mute prayer that his feeling might be akin to compassion, I invited him by voice and gesture to make for a little point of rocks a short distance above us, where I proceeded to join him. I told him my story, and he readily took me aboard. He was a civil old gentleman, of the seafaring sort, who appeared to be cruising about in the evening breeze for ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... notwithstanding the bad weather, pretty generally proceeded to the churches, which will be open morning, noon, and night, for it is a solemn occasion, and thousands will supplicate Almighty God to be pleased to look upon us with compassion, and aid us, in this hour of extremity, to resist the endeavors of our enemies to reduce us ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones
... encumbrance. Let her act with whatever bravery and wisdom she might, her sex still enmeshed us like a silken trap. We could not escape it. And it was a fetter. Mask it as courteously as I would, the fact remained that it was undoubtedly a fetter. I felt a certain compassion for her and her forced dependence, and said to myself that I would hide my own soreness. But her words had bitten, and I am not a ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... conduct which, on a smaller scale, would expose a human being to eternal infamy, then are we disqualified for all just conceptions of the character of God. If wanton cruelty be consistent with Divine compassion, then may deception be reconciled with inviolable faith, and they, who deem themselves to be happy in the electing love of God, may awake at last to the fearful discovery, that, having indulged in the dream of special grace, they are only reserved for a destiny ...
— On Calvinism • William Hull
... squire for killing of his game? or Covetous parson for his tithes distraining? Or roguish lawyer, made you lose your little All in a lawsuit? (Have you not read the "Rights of Man" by Tom Paine?) Drops of compassion tremble on my eyelids, Ready to fall as soon as you have told your Pitiful story. Knife-grinder. Story! God bless you! I have none to tell, Sir; Only last night a-drinking at the 'Chequers,' This poor old hat and breeches, as you see, were Torn in a scuffle. Constables came up for to take me ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... imagine, that the present situation of France was an interesting object even to persons of the lowest rank, and would become the frequent subject of conversation: a young prince, expelled his throne by the sedition of native subjects, and by the arms of strangers, could not fail to move the compassion of all his people whose hearts were uncorrupted by faction; and the peculiar character of Charles, so strongly inclined to friendship and the tender passions, naturally rendered him the hero of that sex whose ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... gentleman, with less compassion than he would have had for brute beasts, delivered himself of all his tedious calculations. As he occasionally gave nine versions of a single income, placing the imaginary person in London, Paris, ...
— The Wrong Box • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... currycomb, and other articles of equine toilet behind the saddle, the haversack with rations slung at his side, to say nothing of such trifles as side-lines and picket-pins, the watering bucket and the wooden basin. The cavalryman's tender heart was stirred by a feeling of compassion, as he tightened up the girth and looked to see that everything was secure in ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... had enjoyed but little stable peace, and now both sides caught the first notes of the summons to war and hurried to the fray. Towns were stormed, and their inhabitants, whether surrendering on composition or at the discretion of the conqueror, found little justice or compassion. The men were more fortunate, in being summarily put to the sword; the women were reserved for the vilest indignities, and then shared the fate of their fathers and husbands. The thirst for revenge caused the Protestant leaders and soldiers to perpetrate ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... therefore, with her maid, she thought it best (A virgin always on her maid relies) To place him in the cave for present rest: And when, at last, he opened his black eyes, Their charity increased about their guest; And their compassion grew to such a size, It opened half the turnpike-gates to Heaven— (St. Paul says, 't is the toll which ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... claims on my parental treasury, save such as I have given to my son Prince. To every other draft I am bankrupt; but merely as a gentleman, I will now for the last time, respond to the petition of a sick woman, whose child is so loyal as to arouse my compassion. Ellice has asked for one hundred dollars. You shall have it. But first, tell me why she did not go to the hospital, and submit to the operation which she says ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... indignant denouncers of the tyrant's character, with the substitution of "I" for "he,"" and the omission of the prefatory "he acts as if he thought" so and so. The only feelings they can possibly excite are disgust at the AEciuses, if regarded as sane loyalists, or compassion if considered as Bedlamites. So much for their tragedies. But even their comedies are, most of them, disturbed by the fantasticalness, or gross caricature, of the persons or incidents. There are few characters that you can really like (even though you should have erased ...
— Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher • S. T. Coleridge
... all, the worshipful lords and masters of this city, that will take compassion over the poor people your neighbors, and also of the great importable hurts, losses, and hinderances, whereof proceedeth extreme poverty to all the king's subjects that inhabit within this city and suburbs ...
— Sir Thomas More • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... war as a means of righting wrongs is full of peril to the whole human race. Not only are bodies killed, but the ideals which alone make life worth living are for the time being lost to sight. In place of those finer attributes of our nature—compassion, gentleness, forgiveness—are ...
— The Suffrage Cook Book • L. O. Kleber
... with the greatest deference and respect, to lay at your feet the following genuine Narrative; the chief design of which is to excite in your august assemblies a sense of compassion for the miseries which the Slave-Trade has entailed on my unfortunate countrymen. By the horrors of that trade was I first torn away from all the tender connexions that were naturally dear to my heart; ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano
... expresses with the freedom and spirit of Japanese design a piety as wild and tender as Jacopo da Todi's, a sweetness of emotion as sincere and dainty as of a Virgin and Child carved in ivory by a French craftsman of the fourteenth century. The mystic beauty of Simone Martini, the agonized compassion of the young Bellini, are embodied by Crivelli in forms which have the strength of line and the metallic lustre of old Satsuma or lacquer, and which are no less tempting to the touch. Crivelli must be treated by himself and as the product ...
— The Venetian Painters of the Renaissance - Third Edition • Bernhard Berenson
... and ships carrying relief to the sorely bereaved and stricken people of Belgium, though the latter were provided with safe conduct through the proscribed areas by the German Government itself and were distinguished by unmistakable marks of identity, have been sunk with the same reckless lack of compassion or ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... he was most merry, saying, 'I wish my dearest Georgie could enjoy this here sight along with me,' and when you mentioned t'other's name, you see, he couldn't stand it." And the honest Captain's own eyes filled with tears, as he turned and looked towards the object of his compassion. ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... doubtful event suffice to rouse Hilda's fears to such a pitch? If the man came back, he would come as a suppliant, entreating to be received once, at least, on tolerance. He would come as a penitent prodigal might, to get a word of compassion from his brother, perhaps to borrow money. He could do no harm to any one, beyond the moral shame he brought upon his relatives by prolonging his wretched existence. He was certainly not a particularly dangerous person to Greif himself, and Hilda's warning had been essentially personal, having ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford
... the swell Park Avenue churches; the Church of the Divine Compassion it was called, and it was very "high," with candles and incense—althogh you could hardly smell the incense on this occasion for the scent of the Easter lilies and the ladies. Peter and his friend ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... taken out a fat black cigar with a red-white-and-blue band. He bit off the end and alternately thrust it between his lips or felt of its thickness with a fondling thumb and finger. Luke, watching, felt a sudden compassion for the cigar. It ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... heads,—to dry the hot briny tears which were parching up our miserable vegetating existence—it was in this crisis that Marie Antoinette came, like a messenger sent down from Heaven, graciously to offer the balm of comfort in the sweetest language of human compassion. The pure emotions of her generous soul made her unceasing, unremitting, in her visits to two mortals who must else have perished under the weight of their misfortunes. But for the consolation of her warm friendship we must ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... man was a pattern of apostolic Christianity—pure, patient, self-denying, meek. Love was the element he breathed. His heart not only yearned towards the oppressed of the human family, but his compassion extended to the brute creation, under whose sufferings in the service of man, to use his own expression, "creation at this day doth loudly groan." Though dependent on his own labor for a livelihood, he was ...
— A Visit To The United States In 1841 • Joseph Sturge
... Osmond's attitude had been that Tom might in decency have left, at any rate, some of the books. It was not that Osmond had a taste for book-collecting: it was merely that he did not care to see his house depleted and bookcases empty. But Tom had shown no compassion. He had removed not merely every scrap of a book belonging to himself, but also two bookcases which he happened to have paid for. The weight of public opinion was decidedly against Mr Orgreave, who had to yield and affect pleasantness. Nevertheless books had become a topic ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... spirit has pass'd in compassion and determination around the whole earth, I have look'd for equals and lovers and found them ready for me in all lands, I think some divine rapport has equalized me ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... women likewise are trained up, that in cases of necessity they may not be quite useless; yet they do not rashly engage in war, unless it be either to defend themselves, or their friends, from any unjust aggressors; or out of good-nature or in compassion assist an oppressed nation in shaking off the yoke of tyranny. They indeed help their friends, not only in defensive, but also in offensive wars; but they never do that unless they had been consulted before the breach was made, and being satisfied with the ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... well as I. I can see that it is useless to talk to you. I am sorry that I had a moment's compassion and made the attempt. Please stop the cab ...
— The Brand of Silence - A Detective Story • Harrington Strong
... success to her, who drew nothing from it for her heart or her hopes? Her husband did not care for music. And, moreover, she seldom felt at her ease in salons, where her beauty attracted homage not wholly disinterested. Her position excited a sort of cruel compassion, a morbid curiosity. She was suffering from an inflammatory complaint not infrequently fatal, for which our nosology as yet has found no name, a complaint spoken of among women in confidential whispers. In spite of the silence in which her life was spent, the cause of ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... makes us feel not love but pity for each other. . . . I cannot look at her without compassion! And the things that happen in this life, O Lord! Such things that people would not believe them if they saw them in the newspaper. . . . And when will there be an ...
— The Bishop and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... truth;"(11) notwithstanding repeated rejections, His mercy had continued its pleadings. With more than a father's pitying love for the son of his care, God had "sent to them by His messengers, rising up betimes, and sending; because He had compassion on His people, and on His dwelling-place."(12) When remonstrance, entreaty, and rebuke had failed, He sent to them the best gift of heaven; nay, He poured out all ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White
... the next morning, when Elizabeth Compton, white and heavy-eyed, was brought to the station to identify Jimmy. There was deep compassion in the young man's face as he was ushered into the presence of the stricken girl, while at sight of him hers ...
— The Efficiency Expert • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... take place in a slave country. Owing to a quarrel and a lawsuit, the owner was on the point of taking all the women and children from the male slaves, and selling them separately at the public auction at Rio. Interest, and not any feeling of compassion, prevented this act. Indeed, I do not believe the inhumanity of separating thirty families, who had lived together for many years, even occurred to the owner. Yet I will pledge myself, that in humanity and good feeling he was superior ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... custom has been abolished, and the cage is now boarded up, the miserable and destitute condition of these unhappy persons remains the same. We no longer suffer them to appeal at the prison gates to the charity and compassion of the passersby; but we still leave unblotted the leaves of our statute book, for the reverence and admiration of succeeding ages, the just and wholesome law which declares that the sturdy felon ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... Lombardy for the Emperor, had made many a long prayer and procession; but the saints appeared to take no compassion on him, and he now withdrew from the capital. A revolutionary party had always existed there, as indeed in every part of the Austrian dominions beyond the Alps; and the tricolor cockade, the emblem of France, was now mounted by multitudes of the ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... and soul had risen in hot rebellion and fierce hate against the Countess of Lanswell. They went out in sweetest love and compassion to her fair faced rival now. The ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay
... in nights that brought no rest, and through long hours of weary day, Alma had put her heart to the proof, and acquitted it of any feeling save a natural compassion for the man Hugh Carnaby had killed. She had never loved Redgrave, had never even thought of him with that curiosity which piques the flesh; yet so inseparably was he associated with her life at its points of utmost tension and ardour, that ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... are who would willingly barter A queen's diadem for the crown of a martyr. They want to be pitied, not envied. To know That the world feels compassion makes joy of their woe; And the keenest delight in their misery lies, If only their friends will look ...
— Three Women • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... treacherous and bloody massacre were brought together, they began to put us in irons, I and seven more being chained together by the neck, others by their feet, and others again by the hands. This being done they all left us, except two soldiers appointed to keep guard over us. These soldiers had compassion upon us, and eased us of the bands which tied our hands behind; for most of us were so tightly bound that the blood was ready to start ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... statesman; they give out that his head is touched, and see paralysis and epilepsy in every speech and every despatch. The time, too, nearly ripe for his great schemes, made it doubly necessary that he should exert himself, and prevent being shelved with a plausible excuse of tender compassion for his infirmities. As soon therefore as he learned that Legard had left Paris, he thought himself safe for a while in that quarter, and surrendered his thoughts wholly to his ambitious projects. Perhaps, too, with the susceptible vanity of a middle-aged man, who has had his bonnes ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... face set and ghastly, hardly a stir among his tatters to assure them that he yet breathed; and Drake recognized with a thrill of horror, though more wan, more woful, more shadow-like, if possible, the man who had so moved his compassion on the night of his arrival. Keegan knelt beside him, and put his corner of cake to the sufferer's mouth, saying, "Ate a bit, Cap'n dear; thry now"; and then, seeing that the food rested on white and quiet lips,—"Cap'n, don't ye ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... pupils, Sikes and Nancy, Mr. Bumble and his parish-boy, belong to the same period; when Dickens also began those pathetic delineations that opened to the neglected, the poor, and the fallen, a world of compassion and tenderness. Yet I think it was not until the third book, Nickleby, that he began to have his place as a writer conceded to him; and that he ceased to be regarded as a mere phenomenon or marvel of fortune, who had achieved success by any other means than that of deserving it, and who challenged ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... To prove how unfounded their notions were, I ate some platanos, and then washing down one poison by the other, I immediately swallowed a mouthful of brandy. My Peruvian friends were filled with dismay. Addressing me alternately in terms of compassion and reproach, they assured me I should never return to Lima alive. After spending a very agreeable day, we all arrived quite well in the evening at Lima. At parting, one of my companions seriously observed that we should never see each other again. Early next morning they anxiously called to ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... made one of the spectators. Her instinct would have been to remain away, for the sympathy she could not help but feel, could not betray itself, without at once ranking her in opposition to the judgment of both husband and father. Anne Hutchinson's condition was one to excite the compassion and interest of every woman, but it had no such effect on her judges, who forced her to stand till she nearly fell from exhaustion. Food was denied her; no counsel was allowed, or the presence of any friend who could have helped by presence, ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... no fear for her own safety, but great compassion for others. She began to hate the smiling face of Dr. Legrand. She heard something of the enormous sums he charged, and wondered what Lucien was paying for her, and how long he would have to pay it. He had said that at least a month must elapse ...
— The Light That Lures • Percy Brebner
... came the women, praying: "Let be as thou hast said, Yet give us women quarter, for we no blood have shed!" At sight of these poor wretches the hero's anger failed, And soft compassion entered ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... at home for upwards of half a century; he had intended his disembodied allowance for the use of his widowed and infirm mother, but it must now be transmitted to him for his own support until he can arrive in England. But, Sir, I do not wish to excite compassion in his behalf, all I request is that he may have justice done him, and if it be, I shall be informed in the next letter, that the necessary order has been given to the Pay Office for the issue of his arrears. I have the honor ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... between two which are closely related, as if it were of the same kind. The gifts of money, or of direction, or of pity, are one in kind. The right use of wealth comes from the gift of God's grace; so does the right use of any sway which any of us have over any of our brethren; and so does the glow of compassion, the exercise of the natural human sympathy which belongs to all, and is deepened and made tenderer and intenser by the gift of the Spirit. It would be a very different Church, and a very different world, if Christians, who were not conscious ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... only to a man whose mind was off its balance—and even he could not retain it for more than a minute or two; but in that space of time he uttered a few wild words, which caused the young monk to raise his dark eyes to his face with a look of sorrowful compassion. ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... unreasonable as to expect any one to be always at hand,' said Charles, smiling, as he looked up at the frank, open face, and lustrous hazel eyes turned on him with compassion at the sight of his crippled, helpless figure, and with a bright, cordial ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... suffering and dying rings in our ears, as they are dragged from their beds, to be exposed to the inclemencies of the ice-covered sea in an open boat. Among them appears the young son of Hudson, whose tender years can wake no compassion in the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... did not express surprise or horror—nothing but kindness and compassion, while he answered, "My poor girl, I was afraid how it might have been." Then he led her to a chair and sat down by her side, so as to let her perceive that he was ready to listen, and would give her time. He might be in haste, but it was ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... said, in a passage quoted with applause by Johnson (Works, vi. 69), that 'it is observable that he who best knows our formation has trusted no one thing of importance to our reason or virtue; he trusts to our vanity or compassion ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... some lessons which he gave at a school at Highgate;—when Clive saw, or fancied he saw, the lonely senior eyeing with hungry eyes the luncheons of cheese and bread, and sweetstuff, which the young lads of the studio enjoyed, I promise you Mr. Clive's wrath against Chivers was speedily turned into compassion and kindness, and he sought, and no doubt found, means of feeding Chivers without offending his ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... my last stay at Paris, when ill, broken down, and despairing, I sat brooding over my fate, my eyes fell on the score of my 'Lohengrin,' totally forgotten by me. Suddenly I felt something like compassion that this music should never sound from off the death-pale paper. I wrote two lines to Liszt; his answer was the news that preparations for the performance were being made on the largest scale the limited means of Weimar would permit. Everything that men and circumstances could do was done ...
— Among the Great Masters of Music - Scenes in the Lives of Famous Musicians • Walter Rowlands
... payment of large sums: in consequence of which they were called "Jew-masters," and were in danger of being attacked by the populace and by their powerful neighbours. These persecuted and ill- used people, except indeed where humane individuals took compassion on them at their own peril, or when they could command riches to purchase protection, had no place of refuge left but the distant country of Lithuania, where Boleslav V., Duke of Poland (1227-1279) had before granted them liberty of conscience; and King Casimir the Great (1333-1370), ...
— The Black Death, and The Dancing Mania • Justus Friedrich Karl Hecker
... heard, and perhaps it colored everything else with gloom. Why was Angus holding my hand as we glided? why was I by his side as we stood? and as he spoke, why was I so dazzled with delight at the sound that I could not gather the sense? Oh, why, but that I loved him, and that his noble compassion would make him the same to me at first as ever,—slowly, slowly, slowly lowering, while he turned to Effie or some other fair-faced lass? Ah, it seemed to me then in a rebellious heart that my lot was bitter. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... in their families heard talk of La Blanchotte; and, although in public she was welcome enough, the mothers among themselves treated her with a somewhat disdainful compassion, which the children had imitated without ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... bemoaning the cruelty of fate, used to wander daily along the shores of the lake where the maiden was compelled to dwell in her guise of a swan, and eventually Ritmagar, apparently touched to a limited compassion, permitted the Swan-Maiden to resume her human form once a day during the hour immediately preceding sunset. But the condition was attached that she must always return to the lake ere the sun sank below the horizon, when she would be compelled to reassume her shape of a swan. Should ...
— The Lamp of Fate • Margaret Pedler
... writer of his age, associated himself with and encouraged the lowest panders of a venal press; deluging, nauseating the public mind with the offal and garbage of Billingsgate abuse and vulgar slang; shewing no remorse, no relenting or compassion towards the victims of this nefarious and organized system of party-proscription, carried on under the mask of literary criticism and fair discussion, insulting the misfortunes of some, and trampling on ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... doubt; but she had kept at least the poor man's treasure, a simple heart. The young man was pleased with her prattling, and as he looked at the young girl he thought of the past and felt a sort of compassion for her. As she was silent for a moment, the poet said to her, "Do you know that you have become very pretty? What a charming complexion you have! ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... the Indians with bloodhounds, like wild beasts; they sacked the New World with no more temper or compassion than a city taken by storm; but destruction must cease, and frenzy be stayed; the remnant of the Indian population which had escaped the massacre mixed with its conquerors, and adopted in the end their ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... moral symmetry and loveliness. Humanity in its most forbidding guise interested him, for his heart was warm and large and overflowed with a great pity for the victims of evil. In this respect he was like his Master, who had "compassion on the multitude." His anticipation of his life-work was as non-professional as that of a mother who yearns over the children she cannot help loving. Lottie appeared strong and lovely by nature. It seemed to him that the half-effaced, ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... his ribs. He picked up the gun and fired it nearly at random. He saw Smithers moving feebly, and Tommy had a vast compassion for Smithers, but— He shuddered suddenly. Something had struck him a heavy blow in the shoulder. And something else battered at his leg. There was no sound that could be heard above the thunder of the crude-oil motor, but Tommy, was queerly aware of buzzing things flying ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... is thus far more powerfully educative emotionally than intellectually; and if the poet has worked with wisdom, he has bred in us habits of right feeling in respect to life, he has familiarized our hearts with love and anger, with compassion and fear, with courage, with resolve, has exercised us in them upon their proper occasions and in their noble expression, has opened to us the world of emotion as it ought to be in showing us that world ...
— Heart of Man • George Edward Woodberry
... its defeat; although she certainly cherished the idea of bringing the two young people together, it was not so much with the mere wish to be the means of accomplishing a ceremony, as to see them happy. For she had a sincere desire for the welfare of Eleanor, for whom she felt a compassion on account of her dependent condition, and an attachment for her virtues and affectionate manner to herself; besides the esteem, we have already said, she felt for our hero. She, however, determined, without a violation ...
— Fern Vale (Volume 1) - or the Queensland Squatter • Colin Munro
... they, it seems, had resolved by the way that the first of them who received the child should dash it upon the ground. However, when Labda brought and gave it, it happened by divine providence that the child smiled at the man who had received it; and when he perceived this, a feeling of compassion prevented him from killing it, and having this compassion he delivered it to the next man, and he to the third. Thus it passed through the hands of all the ten, delivered from one to another, since none of them could bring himself to destroy its life. So they gave the child back to its ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 2 (of 2) • Herodotus
... Theodore eagerly, "it is not! I do not doubt His goodness—His compassion even for the wretched creatures whom He formed out of dust. But I—thoughtless in my youth; self-confident in prosperity; ungrateful and rebellious under affliction; how can such a wretch as I have been, believe in the love of God to me! ...
— The Fairy Godmothers and Other Tales • Mrs. Alfred Gatty
... robbed me of a treasure that empires cannot give! Reflection, however, and daily experience, not only inspire me with resignation to the Wise Ruler of all events, but fill me with gratitude that God in compassion has removed her from a scene of afflictions, from new trials, from growing evils, which a tender sensibility like hers too keenly felt ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... been due principally to the action of governments, which plunged harmless millions into war for dynastic ends, and paralysed human energy by their own blind and senseless interference with the natural course of exchange. Compassion for the poor and the suffering, a just resentment against laws which in the supposed interest of a minority condemned the mass of the nation to a life of want, gave moral fervour and elevation to the teaching of Cobden and those ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... before the luncheon hour, and re-read it once or twice; then dropping it listlessly upon her lap, she turned upon her fellow-passengers a look of such guileless interest that they might have been excused had they been moved by that compassion, so frequently unwarranted, for innocence on the threshold ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... truly faithful minister of Jesus Christ, being one morning in prayer on one side of the Mountain of Alvernia, elevating himself to God by the seraphic fervor of his desires and by the motives of tender and affectionate compassion, transforming himself into Him who, by the excess of His charity, chose to be crucified for us; he saw, as it were, a seraph, having six brilliant wings, and all on fire, descending towards him from the height of heaven. This seraph came with a most ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe
... walked away, an expression of stern indignation replaced the benign look that usually reigned over his noble features, and he now resolutely closed all the avenues of compassion, along which divers fallacious excuses and charitable conjectures had marched into his heart, and stifled for a time the rigorous verdict ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... doom which awaited him, and, from having become traitor, even proceeded to enter the active service of the enemy and to raise his hand against the country which, but for these crimes, would have held him in honorable remembrance. The heart of English-speaking nations has ever been moved to compassion for the unfortunate fate of the messenger who conducted the treasonable correspondence between Arnold and Clinton,—one of the most accomplished officers in the British army, Major Andre. No influence—not even his deeply moved sympathy—could induce Washington ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XI • John Lord
... a chair and regards the unhappy man with a look of tender compassion: "You poor thing, I've almost ...
— Evening Dress - Farce • W. D. Howells
... for to saye dayly knelynge in remembrace of the passyon of our lorde & his fyue wodes / & of the grete compassion of our blessyd lady .v. Pater noster / and .v. Aue ...
— A Ryght Profytable Treatyse Compendiously Drawen Out Of Many and Dyvers Wrytynges Of Holy Men • Thomas Betson
... hat. All the time I could not have borne to depart so, and I believed she would not let me. Nor would she but for the mortal pang I had given her pride, that cowed her compassion and ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... Illustrious, or that cou'd merit Censure? Indeed some People are not to be reclaim'd by Ridicule; and Mr. Collier knowing their Vertues, with how much Compos'dness and Resignation they can bear a Hiss, out of Compassion, took Example by the Town and ...
— A Letter to A.H. Esq.; Concerning the Stage (1698) and The - Occasional Paper No. IX (1698) • Anonymous
... desired nothing. Knowing Bayreuth a failure, fancying his whole life a failure, from a particular point of view, one idea seized hold on him—- the idea that those who did not like his music were in a pitiable condition, and compassion exhorted him to rescue them, to redeem them. He meant to heap coals of fire upon a generation that refused to recognise him as a prophet. He did it—with a double vengeance: he made the detractors come to his knees and he made a fortune out of them—them alone. ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... the wonders of the Orford Collection, of which he ever after carried a catalogue in his head, a servant who was waiting on the company in the great gallery spilled some hot coffee over his legs. The hostess was all kindness and compassion, and when, after a while, she asked him how he was feeling, the little fellow looked up in her face, and replied, 'Thank you, madam, the agony ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... weeping and lamenting for his death, attired in mourning vesture, tare her haire and beat her breast, and came presently into the stable, saying, Is it reason that this carelesse beast should do nothing all day but hold his head in the manger, filling and belling his guts with meat without compassion of my great miserie, or remembrance of the pittiful death of his slaine Master: and contemning my age and infirmity, thinketh that I am unable to revenge his mischiefs, moreover he would perswade me, that he were not ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius
... an affecting scene. The Vicar with his wounded arm is on his bed, with his distressed family about him. Olivia has fainted on hearing the news of her betrayer's intended marriage, and the mother is attending her. "My compassion for my poor daughter, overpowered by this new disaster, interrupted what I had further to observe. I bade her mother support her, and after a short time she recovered." The countenance of the Vicar in this scene is the best among the illustrations—of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... general idea of what was said to them. Thus, little by little, and by dint of frequent reiteration, accompanied by much laughter and many blushes on the part of their fair instructresses, the two young Englishmen learned that they owed their lives to the compassion of the Senoritas Clara and Dolores; who, watching the fight from their window, had been so greatly impressed by the gallant bearings of Dick and Phil, that when the two were seen to go down in the melee, ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... into attention and respect by her dignity and gentleness of manner. She read to them some portion of "the old old story," and spoke to them with such earnest love, that their hearts were melted within them. Many of them heard, for the first time, of the divine compassion of Him who came to seek and to save that which was lost; and as they listened, tears stole into eyes that were strangely unused to shed them; and from some of the poor wanderers a cry went up to the merciful Father, and was the first prayer in the sinful, sorrowful life. In 1816, she ...
— Grace Darling - Heroine of the Farne Islands • Eva Hope
... miseries, through want of meat and money, I do protest to God so much moves, my soul with commiseration of that which is past, and makes my heart tremble to think of the like to come again, that I humbly beseech your Majesty, for Jesus Christ sake, to have compassion on their lamentable estate past, and send some money to prevent the ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... her remark alone. But his few words left on Marcella a painful impression, which renewed her compassion of the night before. This young fellow, just married, protesting against an over-exaltation of the affections!—it struck her as half tragic, half grotesque. And, of course, it was explained by the idiosyncrasies ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Moore suspected something of it all, for he knew more of M'Adam than did the others. While Owd Bob knew it as did no one else. He could tell it from the touch of the boy's hand on his head; and the story was writ large upon his face for a dog to read. And he would follow the lad about with a compassion in his sad gray eyes greater ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... comming, [8] Then straight it is our fashion, My Legge I tie, close to my thigh, To moue him to compassion. Still ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... more earnestness to this object, as though she looked for some sign from it: but, receiving none, she struck her hands violently together; in a transport of rage upset the spinning-wheel; and fell back into her seat. If Bertram had at first felt compassion on witnessing the expressions of her grief and the anguish of her expectation, this feeling was soon put to flight by the frantic explosion of anger which followed. So great was his consternation that he resolved to ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... against Master Weston; and it would have gone hard with him when he was called in, if a most unexpected witness had not risen up in his favour. His wife had brought in her arms a little girl about eighteen months old, partly perhaps to move compassion in her favour; for a woman with a child in her arms is always an object that excites kind feelings. The little girl had looked shy and frightened, and had been as quiet as a lamb during her mother's examination; but she no sooner saw her father, from whom she had been a fortnight ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... ceasing, who often pardoned my uncalled-for folly and negligence, who did not let his anger turn fiercely against me, who allowed me to work with him, though I did not promptly follow what was shown me and what the Spirit suggested; and the Lord had compassion on me among thousands and thousands, because he saw my good-will; but then I knew not what to do, because many were hindering my mission, and were talking behind my back, and saying: "Why does he run into danger among enemies who know not God?" This was not ...
— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various
... line, "when I saw the bear rushing upon thee, I thought it was the Manitou who had taken compassion on my sufferings, my heart for an instant felt light and happy; but as death was near thee, very near, the Good Spirit whispered his wishes, and I have saved thee for happiness. It is I who must die! I am nothing, have no friends, no one to care for me, to love me, ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... could not answer. Having no doubt bewept this sorrow too often to find fresh tears, her eyes followed her son with restless compassion. He, beside the window, was hunting among the chairs and lounges crowded in this ...
— The Ink-Stain, Complete • Rene Bazin
... separate, at once my lips All trembling kissed The book and writer both Were love's purveyors In its leaves that day We read no more' While thus one spirit spake The other wailed so sorely, that heart-struck I, through compassion fainting, seem'd not far From death and like a corse fell to ...
— Ravenna, A Study • Edward Hutton
... window at white hills and valleys and scattered pines whose every branch was a green platter for a cold feast of snow. Sometimes a solitary farmhouse would fly by, ugly and bleak and lone on the white waste; and with each one she had an instant of chill compassion for the souls shut in ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... vex ourselves with useless fears. We have the promise, 'As thy days, so shall thy strength be.' And we know that nothing can befall us without the will of our Heavenly Father, whose love and compassion are infinite. 'We know that all things work together for good to ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... although they might have arrived at Capua before night, yet, uncertain with respect to the fidelity of the allies, and because shame embarrassed them, in need of every thing, they threw themselves carelessly on the ground, on each side of the road: which being told at Capua, just compassion for their allies got the better of the arrogance natural to the Campanians. They immediately sent to the consuls their ensigns of office, the fasces and lictors; to the soldiers, arms, horses, clothes, and provisions in abundance: and, on their approach to Capua, the whole senate and people ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... fearful lest they might do something that would bring his wrath upon them. Their life is a life of fear and of bondage. Paul had no such fears and no such feelings. He knew that the great heart of God is a heart of love, a heart of tender pity, compassion, and sympathy. He knew that God is tender toward his earthly children. Why, even when we were sinners, Christ died for us! and the Father so loved us that he gave his only begotten Son. This love was for rebels. How much ...
— Heart Talks • Charles Wesley Naylor
... and through his interpretation Jack was able to give a rather more clear account of me than at first. The captain was at all events satisfied that I was the child of English parents of a good position in life, and taking compassion on my destitute condition, he desired Jack to leave me in the cabin, giving him permission, however, to come aft and attend to me. Jack would rather have kept me forward with himself, but believing that this arrangement was for my good, ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... rival of filling his speech with everything that was personal, inflammatory, and invidious, he remarked:—"I am not surprised if he should pretend to be the butt of ministerial persecution; and if, by striving to excite the public compassion, he should seek to reinstate himself in that popularity which he once enjoyed, but which he so unhappily has forfeited. For it is the best and most ordinary resource of these political apostates to court, to offer themselves to persecution for the sake ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... exuberance. He could never take the rigorously impassive attitude which Flaubert taught Maupassant to assume. Daudet not only feels for his characters, but he is quite willing that we should be aware of his compassion. ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... determination to expose this man who had falsified all trust. But then came the thought of the girl, and, most of all, there came the words of his dying mother, "Be good, my boy, and God will make you great"; and for his mother's sake he had compassion on the girl, and sought no restitution from her husband. And now, ten years later, he did not regret that he had stayed his hand. The world had ceased to call Lepage a genius. He had not fulfilled the hope once held of him. Hume knew this from ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... She did not exactly think that the carriage would console her poor favourite; but she did it as she would have ordered something specially nice to eat for any one who had broken his leg. Her soft heart had compassion for misery, though she would sometimes show her sympathy by strange expressions. Lady Linlithgow was almost angry about the carriage. "How many carriages and how many horses does Lady Fawn keep?" ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... himself, who saith that it is a hard thing for a rich man to come to heaven; a sore saying, and spoken of Him that knoweth the truth. The second is of St. John, whose saying is this: He that hath the substance of this world, and seeth his brother in necessity, and shutteth up his compassion and mercy from him, how can he say he loveth God? The third {p.257} is of St. James, who speaketh to the covetous and rich men after this manner: Weep and howl for the misery which shall come upon you; your riches doth rot, your clothes be moth-eaten, your gold and silver is cankered ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... into the significance of emotional life of woman. Man wants to be understood, woman felt. With this emotion she spoils much that man might do because of his sense of justice. Indeed, a number of qualities which the woman uses to make herself noted are bound up with her emotional life, more or less. Compassion, self-sacrifice, religion, superstition,—all these depend on the highly developed, almost diseased formation of her emotional life. Feminine charity, feminine activity as a nurse, feminine petitions ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... daughter with sincere compassion, she went up to her and looked for the thousandth time in ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... body. She was beautifully dressed. Her shoes were adorable, and the semi-transparent hose over her fine ankles. She made a most disturbing, an unbearable, figure of compassion. She needed wisdom, protection, guidance, strength. Every bit of her seemed to appeal for these qualities. But at the same time she dismayed. He moved nearer to her. Yes, she had grandeur. All the costly and valuable objects in the drawing-room she had rejected in favour of ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... This compassion of Augustin was shewn particularly in his meeting with Emeritus, the Donatist Bishop of Cherchell (or as it was then called, Mauretanian Caesarea), one of the most stubborn among the irreconcilables. His attitude in dealing with this uncompromising enemy was not only humane, ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... with his skinny hands. "Rima! Rima! have mercy on me!" he cried out piteously. "I cannot go to Riolama, it is so far—so far. And I am old and should meet my death. Oh, Rima, child of the woman I saved from death, have you no compassion? I shall die, ...
— Green Mansions - A Romance of the Tropical Forest • W. H. Hudson
... merchant of Lucknow, was at Bondee, selling some shawl goods to the Rajah, on the occasion of his brother's marriage. He had many servants with him, and among them Janoo, a khidmutgar lad, and an old sipahee, named Ramzan Khan. Janoo took compassion upon the poor boy, extracted the arrow from his thigh, had his wound dressed, and prepared a bed for him under the mango-tree, where he himself lodged, but kept him tied to a tent-pin. He would at that time eat nothing but raw flesh. To wean him from this, ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... them to the scene of the tragedy. The stranger lifted those dark eyes of his, and looked so unspeakably handsome, that Rose was melted to deeper compassion than ever. ...
— Kate Danton, or, Captain Danton's Daughters - A Novel • May Agnes Fleming
... overlooked, still retained the post of treasurer; but he was aided in the discharge of his duties by gentlemen of rather more enlarged and sympathising minds: his office of inspector, too, was shared by those who knew how to combine reason with strictness, comfort with economy, compassion with uprightness. The school, thus improved, became in time a truly useful and noble institution. I remained an inmate of its walls, after its regeneration, for eight years: six as pupil, and two as teacher; and in both capacities ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... head, and a little bread for her support! You are not aware, Sire, that if the hour of my death were now to strike, no one would be beside me to close my eyes, and to say, 'This is the body of Marie de Medicis.' Take then compassion on my very humble request, Sire; and receive, whatever may be your decision, ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... foolish idea of a dead body asking for compassion was coming true. For there was a huddled-up form lying on the bottom of the boat, its head inclined half on and half off the stern thwart, its whole attitude suggestive of ...
— Adventures in Many Lands • Various
... assemblage, by several of whom Jack was recognised. But such was the violence of his grief,—such the compunction he exhibited, that all but one looked on with an eye of compassion. That person ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... parrot. The bird could say, "Scratch a poll, Poll," already, and "Hullo!" those keys to the English language. The maid Augustine, having completed some small duty, would often come and stand, her head on one side, gazing down with a sort of inquiring compassion in her wise, young, clear-brown eyes. It seemed to her who was straight and sturdy as a young tree both wonderful and sad that Madame should be seventy-seven, and so frail—Madame who had no lines in her face and such beautiful grey hair; who had so strong a will-power, too, ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... more wicked and more dangerous than we could at any other time suffer to enter our imagination. As anger is justly said to be a short madness, so, while the frenzy is upon us, blood is shed as easily as water, and the mind is so filled with fury that there is no room left for compassion. There cannot be a stronger proof of what I have been observing than in the unhappy end of the poor woman who is the subject of ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... Milly came in. Ian stretched out his hand towards her with protective tenderness; but even at the moment when his whole soul was moved by an impulse of compassion so strong that it seemed almost love, a spirit within him arose and mocked at all hypotheses, telling him that this poor stricken wife of his, seemingly one with the lady of his heart, was not ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... doctor suddenly contradicted, a vision of the brown-eyed idol of the hospital flashing up before him. "She merely believes in voicing her thoughts; but she is the essence of compassion and love. She would not want to wound another's feelings ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown
... sea-man was very severely bit by a louse on his neck, which he caught; and stooping down to crack it between his nails, many of the sailors near him had their heads taken off by a chain-shot from the enemy, which dashed their blood and brains about him; on which he had compassion upon the poor louse, returned him to his place and bid him live there at discretion, for as he had saved his life, he was bound in gratitude to save his." This recital threw my Lord Bolingbroke into a violent fit ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... attitudes, will remain among their primary associations, and reduce them throughout their time of studious preparation for life to the moral imbecility of an inward giggle at what might have stimulated their high emulation or fed the fountains of compassion, trust, and constancy. One wonders where these parents have deposited that stock of morally educating stimuli which is to be independent of poetic tradition, and to subsist in spite of the finest images being degraded and ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... compassion for me," said T'yonni. "And now about a place where you can live. Choti, a painter, whose pictures you see around here, lives with the school-teacher up the road, and he might find you a place. He's an American, as I am, and I suppose ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... her with a sudden feeling which was not awe, nor compassion, nor love, but was all of these. He felt in his soul the subtlest sadness in all the world—the sadness of a strong man who looks upon a beautiful young girl who ...
— The Spirit of Sweetwater • Hamlin Garland
... fiercer rebellion now. I would go home. I would appeal to my father. Hard as he had always been with me he was at least a man, not a cold abstraction, like the Church and the law, without bowels of compassion or sense of ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... of this. I know He wouldn't, for He was always tender and pitiful full of compassion. I called it religeon for oritory, but it hain't religeon, it is a relict of old Barberism who, under the cloak of Religeon, whipped quakers and hung prophetic souls, that the secrets of Heaven had been revealed to, secrets hidden from the ...
— Samantha Among the Brethren, Complete • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... was recalled by the arrival of another student, who took the chair next to hers a little deformed man, with a face which looked prematurely old, and sad, restless eyes. A few hours before she would have regarded him with a sort of shuddering compassion; now with the compassion there came to her the thought of compensation which even here and now might make the poor fellow happy. Was he not immortal? Might he not here and now learn what she had just learned, gain that unspeakable joy? And might not the knowledge ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... Uraga's brow grows darker as he listens to the explanation. It has nothing to do with the death of Pedrillo, or compassion for his fate—upon which he scarce spends a thought—but whether there has been a miscarriage of that message of which the drowned man was the bearer. His next interrogatory, quickly put, is to get satisfied on ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... A powerful feeling of compassion rose in our hero's breast as he looked at these moral wrecks of humanity; for their characters and prospects were ruined, though their physique was not much impaired. It seemed to him such an awful home-coming, ...
— Blue Lights - Hot Work in the Soudan • R.M. Ballantyne
... but when an English lady rode upon a side-saddle in an Italian city, where the sight was unusual, she was universally gazed at by the populace; to some she appeared an object of astonishment, to others of compassion:—"Ah! poverina," they exclaimed, "n'ha ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... his career, Collins was, however, an object for sympathy instead of censure; and though few refuse their compassion to the confirmed lunatic, it is rare that the dreadful state of irresolution and misery, which sometimes exist for years before the fatal catastrophe, receives either pity ...
— The Poetical Works of William Collins - With a Memoir • William Collins
... amber leaves drift on through the cold wide world, until their beauty is spent, and until wrecked and faded they lay themselves down by the withered blades to die. But oh! there are again those stainless leaves that glide into the fingers of the Great Gatherer of Beauty, to find in His compassion and His mercy a refuge from the coldest blasts. The pity is that these last are, like the leaves of the Autumn trees, the scarcest in number; or, after all is the happy life of one summer month, price enough for a "forever" of ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... of thought, they willingly abandon to others the guardianship of their thoughts. And if it happens that nobler necessities agitate their soul, they cling with a greedy faith to the formulas that the state and the church hold in reserve for such cases. If these unhappy men deserve our compassion, those others deserve our just contempt, who, though set free from those necessities by more fortunate circumstances, yet willingly bend to their yoke. These latter persons prefer this twilight of obscure ideas; where the feelings have more intensity, ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... to those who have such compassion on my hunger that they counsel me provide myself bread? Certes, I know not, save that, whenas I seek to imagine in myself what would be their answer, an I should of necessity beseech them thereof, to wit, of bread, methinketh they would reply, "Go seek it among thy fables." ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... weaknesses of men, of what kind soever (natural or moral, in quality or in act), considering whence they spring, and how much we are all subject to them, and do need excuse for them, do in equity challenge compassion to be had of them; not complacency to be taken in them, or mirth drawn from them; they, in respect to common humanity, should rather be studiously connived at, and concealed, or mildly excused, than wilfully laid open, and wantonly descanted upon; they ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... (1) passion, passive, impassive, impassioned, compassion, pathos, pathetic, impatient, apathy, sympathy, antipathy; (2) passible, impassible, dispassionate, pathology, telepathy, hydropathy, homeopathy, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... would laugh at me as a dreaming enthusiast, or pity me as a timorous wretch who was shocked at the appearance of futurity. But whoever laughs at me for being right, or pities me for being sensible of my errors, is more entitled to my compassion than my resentment. A future life may very well strike terror into any man who has not acted well in this life; and he must have an uncommon share of courage indeed who does not shrink at the presence of his God. You see, my dear doctor, the apprehension of death will soon bring the most profligate ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 286, December 8, 1827 • Various
... WOULD think these things? Say to the valiant Tarik, I depart Forthwith: he knows not from what heaviness Of soul I linger here; I could endure No converse, no compassion, no approach, Other than thine, whom the same cares improved Beneath my father's roof, my foster-brother, To brighter days and happier end, I hope; In whose fidelity my own resides With Tarik and with his compeers and chief. I cannot share the gladness ...
— Count Julian • Walter Savage Landor
... cruelties may be true among the lower species, but it should not be true among human creatures. We are rational beings and ought to free ourselves from the fatality of environment, moulding it to our convenience. The animal does not know law, justice or compassion; he lives enslaved in the obscurity of his instincts. We think, and thought signifies liberty. Force does not necessarily have to be cruel; it is strongest when it does not take advantage of its power, ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... at the door, and she entered with something of the apprehension of a victim of the Inquisition facing the torture chamber. She advanced hesitatingly towards the Principal's desk, and stood without speaking, a forlorn enough little figure to have excited compassion in the most mercenary heart. Miss Poppleton glanced at her furtively, and looked away again. She had made up her mind not to allow herself to be worked upon by her feelings, ...
— The Leader of the Lower School - A Tale of School Life • Angela Brazil
... condemnation any provision of the constitution has been violated or any principle of law broken down, then will he be able, humble and low as may be his condition, then will he be able to turn the current of compassion backward, and to look with pity on those who have been his judges. If you are about to visit this respondent with a judgment which shall blast his house; if the bosoms of the innocent and the amiable are to be made ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... it for you," said Miss Julia; "we all feel compassion for the poor lad, who has evidently been led astray by bad companions." In a short time she returned, with an order to the constable in charge of ...
— Dick Cheveley - His Adventures and Misadventures • W. H. G. Kingston
... mother set him to work; he made a poor hand of it, he was so wretched. She at last took compassion on him, and in the evening, when it was now too late for a sail to Inch Coombe, she herself recommended ...
— Christie Johnstone • Charles Reade
... but he did not press it. His voice had none of the old passionate ardour, it was submissive, disconsolate, heart-broken, full of infinite weariness. And Maria was so blinded by her compassion that she did not draw away her hand, but let it lie in his, abandoning herself for a moment to the unutterable rapture of that light contact—a rapture so subtle as hardly to have any physical origin—as if some magnetic ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... spends about half his elegant leisure in devouring the cold victuals of compassion, and the other half in running after the bricks of which he is the provocation and we are the target. Within the last six years we employed as editors upon the unhappy journal which it was intended that this article should ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile
... not disdained to unlatch the sandals of their fathers' guests; but now, at the feet of Mercy, for the first time Repentance knelt. And still the tears continued, unstanched and undetained. Grief, something keener still perhaps, had claimed her as its own. She bent lower. Then Misery looked up at Compassion. ...
— Mary Magdalen • Edgar Saltus |
