"Contentment" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Almighty God be praised!" said the Lady Peveril; "and be the other as our gracious and restored Sovereign may will it. We are great enough for our means, and have means sufficient for contentment, though not for splendour. And now I see, good Master Bridgenorth, the folly of putting faith in idle presentiments of evil. So often had Sir Geoffrey's repeated attempts in favour of the Stewarts led him into new misfortunes, that when, the other morning, ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... maidens and women folk from the evils of drink, greed and outrages resulting from indefensible pass laws and the elimination of bad habits among men by a rightful policy will restore that efficiency, loyalty, and contentment which aforetime were the boast of pioneer administrators in British South Africa, and which if fostered will render them a magnificent asset to the Empire ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... time of fruition at Montebello: of fruition, but not of ease or full contentment; for not only did an average of eight despatches a day claim several hours, during which he jealously guarded his solitude; but Josephine's behaviour served to damp his ardour. As, during the time of absence, she had slighted his urgent entreaties for a daily letter, ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... after Rhoda had spitted the game, John sighed with contentment as he looked at the pile of bones ...
— The Heart of the Desert - Kut-Le of the Desert • Honore Willsie Morrow
... Moreover, this Robin Hood desired the king and queen, with their retinue, to enter the greenwood where, in harbours made of boughs, and decked with flowers, they were set and served plentifully with venison and wine by Robin Hood and his men, to their great contentment, and had other pageants and pastimes, as ye may ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... which is constant even at Egremont Beach. When they rose to go Yetta noticed for the first time a shawl-clad figure on the adjacent bench, and immediately a pair of keen eyes flashed from a face whose plump contentment was framed in a jet black wig of an early ...
— Elkan Lubliner, American • Montague Glass
... after he had done it, it was not all happiness, all contentment, with him. He did feel that he had crippled himself,—impeded himself in running the race, as it were, with a log round his leg. He had offered to marry her, and he must do so at once, or almost at once, because she could now find ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... man who wore the most costly garments, and enjoyed the most luxurious food and drink, and lived in complete contentment. One day there came to his door a sick, half-starved man, who begged for a few of the crumbs that fell from the table. The proud man was wrathful that the miserable wretch should dare to disturb his pleasure, ...
— I.N.R.I. - A prisoner's Story of the Cross • Peter Rosegger
... Mrs. Crump's front arranged, during the time of which operation Morgiana sat in perfect contentment looking at the last French fashions in the Courrier des Dames, and thinking how her pink satin slip would dye, and make just such a mantilla as that represented in the engraving—no sooner was Mrs. ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray
... together of the faculties of the soul within itself, in order that it may have the fruition of that contentment in greater sweetness; but the faculties are not lost, neither are they asleep: the will alone is occupied in such a way that, without knowing how it has become a captive, it gives a simple consent to become the prisoner ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... hickory wood fire filled the room with additional cheerfulness, which was scarcely needed, for that awful chill had left her heart for ever. A few days of supreme happiness had given back the peach-like bloom to her cheek and the splendor to her eyes. Full of contentment, all the generous impulses of her character rose and swelled in her bosom, till she longed to share her heaven with anything that was cast ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... from the English nation or the establishment of home rule on some practical basis could insure peace and contentment in Ireland. Nor in the past could one be assured at any time that Ireland would have been contented for any length of time had she been given or acquired what she asked for. Being forced to support ...
— History of Human Society • Frank W. Blackmar
... in helping others was the secret of Sarah Grimke's unvarying contentment, and there was always some one needing the help she was so ready to give, some one whose trials made her feel, she says, ashamed to think of her own. But the infirmities of old age were creeping upon her, and though her mental faculties remained as bright as ever, she ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... generally went rights in woodland and pasture; and even meadow land, after the hay was got in, was open to the use of the villagers. The early New England town took into consideration the welfare and contentment of the individual, but it rated as of even greater importance the interests of the ...
— The Fathers of New England - A Chronicle of the Puritan Commonwealths • Charles M. Andrews
... anything. We never met a man, or woman, or child anywhere in this sunny island who seemed to be unprosperous, or discontented, or sorry about anything. This sort of monotony became very tiresome presently, and even something worse. The spectacle of an entire nation groveling in contentment is an infuriating thing. We felt the lack of something in this community—a vague, an indefinable, an elusive something, and yet a lack. But after considerable thought we made out what it was—tramps. Let them go there, right now, in a body. It is utterly virgin soil. Passage is cheap. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... thinkings and projects of their were private, and did not show on the surface, and therefore threw no shadow upon the celebration. What showed upon the surface was a serene and lofty contentment and a dignity of carriage and gravity of deportment which compelled the admiration and likewise the wonder of the company. All noticed it and all commented upon it, but none was able to divine the secret of it. It was a marvel and a mystery. Three several persons remarked, without suspecting ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... attended Divine Service with some of the troops stationed near by, in a small country church perched high up on the hill-side. Quiet and contentment pervaded everything; not even the sound of a gun ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... temperance: for he says that "temperance results in modesty, shamefacedness, abstinence, chastity, honesty, moderation, lowliness, sobriety, purity." Andronicus also says [*De Affectibus] that "the companions of temperance are gravity, continence, humility, simplicity, refinement, method, contentment." [*Per-se-sufficientiam which could be rendered "self-sufficiency," but for the fact that this is taken in a bad sense. See Q. 169, A. 1.] Therefore it seems that Tully insufficiently reckoned the parts ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... and Rules for attaining it, are not so necessary and useful to Mankind as the Arts of Consolation, and supporting [ones [1]] self under Affliction. The utmost we can hope for in this World is Contentment; if we aim at any thing higher, we shall meet with nothing but Grief and Disappointments. A Man should direct all his Studies and Endeavours at making himself ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... a sigh of contentment at the close of the great chorus in the second Act. After all, Rickman was the ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... sprang upon him and, seizing him by the neck, clung to him with all his might. So determined was he to adopt Belt as his protector that the matter ended by his being taken back to Chontales where he lived in great contentment. ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt
... sigh of contentment as she watched him go to the tube and heard him tell the servant he ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... and dined with great contentment, voting Jacotot a first-rate chef, which he undoubtedly was. He was, however, a better cook than ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... neither made Kendal nor marred him may be gathered for the first part from his contentment to go back to paint in his native land, for the second from the fact that he had a relation with Elfrida Bell which at no point verged toward the sentimental. He would have found it difficult to ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... were shook his crest in plenary contentment. He had the same sensation of creativeness as he had had a while earlier with his son,—a godlike sensation. And he was delighted with his girl. She was so young and so old. And her efforts to play the woman of the world with him were so comic and so touching. ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... one of the best day-laboring women in the village—ready for anything, day and night, in weal and in woe; for she had trained her children, especially Amrei, to manage for themselves at an early age. Industry and frugal contentment made the house one of the happiest in the village. Then came a deadly sickness which snatched away the mother, and the following evening, the father; and a few days later two coffins were carried away from the little ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... contemporary criticism, that his walls were adorned with several rather abortive masterpieces. He had got his learning—and there was more of it than commonly appeared—at Harvard College; and he took a pleasure in old associations, which made it a part of his daily contentment to live so near this institution that he often passed it in driving to Boston. He was extremely interested ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... your feet on your library fender, stupefied with contentment and your soles scorching, your heart is not black; it is only fat. How can it know the lean formality of the furnished room? Your little stenographer, who must wear a smile and fluted collars on ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... a home some day of the most Spartan simplicity, all our needs cut down to the lowest and plainest of possessions, and yet a spirit of hospitality, of contentment, of gaiety, of self-reliance and mutual helpfulness. Books ...
— Perpetual Light • William Rose Benet
... manner, peculiar to persons habituated to command, that she was of high station. He presented her with a blue mantle, a looking-glass, and other gewgaws, which she received with an expression of profound contentment. Upon leaving the vessel she invited the captain to land, and to pay her a visit. Wallis, although still very weak, did not fail to comply with this request next day. He was conducted to a large hut, which covered about 327 feet in length, and 42 in width. The roof was constructed of palm ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... situation as tutor in the house of Casimir Perier. The salary was good, but the duties were too miscellaneous, and what was still worse, there was an end of the delicious liberty of the garret. After a short experience of three weeks Comte returned to neediness and contentment. He was not altogether without the young man's appetite for pleasure; yet when he was only nineteen we find him wondering, amid the gaieties of the carnival of 1817, how a gavotte or a minuet could make people forget ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 10: Auguste Comte • John Morley
... and bounding along a street in the capital. His movements are gay and alert; there is a sparkle in his eyes, a smirk on his lips, a pleasing flush on his beaming face.... He is all contentment and delight. ...
— Dream Tales and Prose Poems • Ivan Turgenev
... took one from his case and gave it to him. Then, striking a match, held it for him, till the wisp of paper and tobacco was well alight; while he lay back, drawing in the fragrant smoke, with a sigh in which contentment ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... I could see her!" returned Mrs. Evringham heartily. She longed to thank Eloise for supplying the sunshine of love to her child while the grandfather was providing for her material wants. She looked at Jewel now, a picture of health and contentment, her bits of small finery in watch and locket standing as symbols of the care ...
— Jewel's Story Book • Clara Louise Burnham
... room. They did not, as the phrase is, "beam" approval; for the act of beaming involves a sort of ecstasy, and Mrs. Maldon was too dignified for ecstasy. But they displayed a mild and proud contentment as she said— ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... was learning submission and contentment with her lot, and would smilingly reply that she considered herself highly favored in being able to see so much, since there were millions of people even in our own land, who could not visit ...
— Elsie's children • Martha Finley
... time the non-white races within the Empire show no signs of enthusiastic contentment at the prospect of existing, like the English 'poor' during the eighteenth century, as the mere material of other men's virtues. They too have their own vague ideas of nationality; and if those ideas do not ultimately ...
— Human Nature In Politics - Third Edition • Graham Wallas
... arrived in person shortly after lunch, she went flying to meet him, and came back hanging on his arm, her face sparkling with happiness and contentment. ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... battled for its protection. She further increased their prospects by laying three others. After that the king made up his mind that she was a most remarkable bird, and went away pleasure-seeking; but the queen settled to brooding, a picture of joyous faith and contentment. ...
— The Song of the Cardinal • Gene Stratton-Porter
... does not suffice at any time, much less does it suffice at the present day, to be content with the uniqueness of the pleasure which you derive from each single act of comprehension made vocal. That contentment is the comfortable privilege of the amateur and the dilettante. It is not sufficient to get a unique pleasure from Mr De la Mare's Arabia or Mr Davies's Lovely Dames or Miss Katherine Mansfield's Prelude or Mr Eliot's Portrait of a ...
— Aspects of Literature • J. Middleton Murry
... my life, I seem come to a stand in the objects of my darling pursuits, which I may say have been almost entirely the pursuit of pleasure, through the medium of the understanding. This I feel must be a useless search, for the further I go, the more unattainable is the contentment which I hoped a degree of excellence might have produced;—the further I go, the further does my idea of perfection extend; therefore this way of attaining happiness I find is impossible. Never in my life was I so sensible of the real weakness of man, ...
— The Annual Monitor for 1851 • Anonymous
... Michelet rails against it because it renders you happy apart from thought or work; to provident women this will seem no evil influence in married life. Whatever keeps a man in the front garden, whatever checks wandering fancy and all inordinate ambition, whatever makes for lounging and contentment, makes just so surely for ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... and agreeable to his Brother. Our expedition to Bordeaux and another we have made since to Bagneres has made a great change upon the Duke. He begins now to familiarise himself to French company, and I flatter myself I shall spend the rest of the time we are to live together not only in Peace and contentment, but in ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... when the oats were attacked, then came the tug of war. The laird was in the fields from morning to night, and the boys would not stay behind; but, with their father's permission, much to the tutor's contentment, devoted what powers they had to the gathering of the fruits of the earth. Hugh himself, whose strength had grown amazingly during his stay at Turriepuffit, and who, though he was quite helpless at the sickle, thought he could wield the scythe, ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... land was so remote, and so divided by vast and unknown seas from the land where our Saviour walked on earth) who was the apostle of that nation, and how it was converted to the faith? It appeared in his face, that he took great contentment in this our question; he said, "Ye knit my heart to you, by asking this question in the first place: for it showeth that you first seek the kingdom of heaven: and I shall gladly, and ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... hang a sign KIPLING BREW (which always interested us), we saw a great, ragged, burly rogue sitting on a doorstep. He had the beard of a buccaneer, the placid face of one at ease with fortune. He hitched up his shirt and shifted from one ham to another with supreme and sunkissed contentment. And Endymion, who sees all things as the beginnings of heavenly poems, said merrily: "As I was walking on Burling Slip, I saw ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... as mine, whose contentment hath other objects than profit or glory, are as glad, simply for the naked merit of virtue, to honour such as advance her, as others that are hard to ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe
... man, clad in buckskin like a savage, brown almost as a savage, as active and as alert, seemed to fit not ill with these environments, nor to lack either confidence or contentment. He walked on steadily, following the path along the bayou bank, and at length paused for a moment, throwing down his burden and stooping to drink at the tiny pool made by the little rivulet which trickled down the face of the bluff. Here he bathed his face and hands ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... they saw was only a restless spirit which had wandered from the Land of Shadows and would speedily vanish again from their sight. In this, however, they were delightfully disappointed. Kwang-Jui and his wife were once more reunited, and for many a long year their hearts were so full of gladness and contentment, that the sorrows which they had endured gradually became effaced from their memories. They always thought with the deepest gratitude of the God of the River, who for eighteen years had kept the unconscious ...
— Chinese Folk-Lore Tales • J. Macgowan
... mistook what really was in his eyes was not material, though he was thinking of days when he believed he had discovered the secret of life—a woman whose life was beautiful; diffusing beauty, contentment, inspiration and peace. She did not know that his look was the wistful look backward, with no look forward; and that alone. She was living a life where new faculties of her nature were being exercised or brought into active being; she was absorbed by it all; it was part ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... I have already said, but instincts: and yet, withal, so cunningly had the few materials of his character been put together, that there was no painful perception of deficiency, but, on my part, an entire contentment with what I found in him. It might be difficult—and it was so—to conceive how he should exist hereafter, so earthly and sensuous did he seem; but surely his existence here, admitting that it was to terminate with his last breath, ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... else seemed to him the supreme bon ton. In reality he was simply empty and rather a fool. In four generations the vigorous hungry blood of the Duvillards, after producing three magnificent beasts of prey, had, as if exhausted by the contentment of every passion, ended in this sorry emasculated creature, who was incapable alike of great knavery ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... interesting news from 27, St. James's Place, which gives an heir to the Spencer Earldom, and has spread a feeling of joy and contentment throughout Althorpe and Mid-Northamptonshire. The latest news, brought down just now by MARJORIBANKS, is "BOBBY is doing as well as can be expected." Business done.—Irish Local Government Bill read Second Time, by 339 votes ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 4, 1892 • Various
... he could see. Happiness was apparent in every look and line of her features and every movement of her person. She was like another woman. All that used to seem wistful in her and unfulfilled had resolved itself into radiant contentment. According to Claude, you could see it with half an eye. She had gained in authority and looks, while she had developed a power of holding her own against her husband that ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... minstrel to indulge his cheerful strain. In the deep wilds of the Adirondacks, where few birds are seen and fewer heard, his note was almost constantly in my ear. Always busy, making it a point never to suspend for one moment his occupation to indulge his musical taste, his lay is that of industry and contentment. There is nothing plaintive or especially musical in his performance, but the sentiment expressed is eminently that of cheerfulness. Indeed, the songs of most birds have some human significance, which, I think, is the source of the delight we take in ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... take, instead of a lower grade of it, the highest grade of something cheaper. So shall you escape waste of time, effort and substance. Never mind sneers at your simple fare. Remember it was Solomon the Wise who wrote: "Better a dinner of herbs and contentment than a stalled ox, and contention therewith." Paraphrase the last clause into "spoiled ox and ptomaines therewith," and you may keep not only self-respect, but that ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams
... loyalty and contentment, reaching Charles at a time when so many of his subjects were rising in rebellion against his authority, was most pleasing to the unfortunate monarch. "Your acknowledgement," he replied to the Governor and the Assembly, ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... was right lucky, except in pickin' pardners," he declared. In a cracked and tuneless voice he began humming a roundelay, evidently intended to express gaiety and contentment. ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... December 23, 1889, Gregoria died and in October, 1890, I married my present wife, whose maiden name was Donna Paz Paderes, and who belongs to an old line of Spanish aristocracy in Mexico. We are now living together in the peace and contentment of old age, well occupied in bringing up and providing for our family of two children, Mary, who will be twenty years old on February 25, 1915, and Charlie, who will be sixteen on the same date. Both our children, ...
— Arizona's Yesterday - Being the Narrative of John H. Cady, Pioneer • John H. Cady
... especially in the dark and in the intricacies of the forest. Ages passed, and the voice rose on another turn of the evolutionary spiral to be expressive of particular emotions beyond the immediate circle of sex—emotions of joy and of fear, of jealousy and of contentment. Finally, we judge, the animal—perhaps the bird was first—began to give utterance to particular "words," indicative not merely of emotions, but of particular things with an emotional halo, such as "food," "enemy," "home." Long afterwards, ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... desolate. The bed of the lake is but a rushy swamp and the massive ruins of the castle only serve to show what their splendor once was, and to impress on the musing visitor the transitory value of human possessions, and the happiness of those who enjoy a humble lot in virtuous contentment. ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... is this favored spot, whose invitation is to the fortunate few who believe that "the noblest mind the best contentment has," and that the fairest land is that which brings forth and nurtures the fairest souls. When youthful friends drift apart, and meet again after years, they find they have been living not only in different cities, ...
— Education and the Higher Life • J. L. Spalding
... man arose with a smile of rare contentment, threw overboard his cigarette, and approaching the boiler-room hatch, called loudly: "Come out of that," and the President of the Federation of Fresh Water Firemen dragged himself wearily out into the flickering lights. He was ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... which bring back to us the tones and accents that have imprinted them, as the hardened sands show us the tracks of extinct animals. The melancholy of old age has a divine tenderness in it, which only the sad experiences of life can lend a human soul. But there is a lower level,—that of tranquil contentment and easy acquiescence in the conditions in which we find ourselves; a lower level, in which old age trudges patiently when it is not using its wings. I say its wings, for no period of life is so imaginative as that which looks to younger ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... this awe-inspiring uproar and go down into the saloon. Here we come into another world, a world of light and peace and contentment. The drawn curtains exclude the sight of the angry elements without, and save for the gentle rocking of the ship and the occasional splashing of water against its sides, we can easily imagine that we are a thousand miles from the sea. Passengers sit at the long tables, reading or chatting. ...
— Story of Chester Lawrence • Nephi Anderson
... structural cell of the social organism. In it lives the power of propagation and renewal of life. It is the foundation of morality, the chief educational institution, and the source of nearly all real contentment among men.' All other questions sink into insignificance when the stability of the family is at stake. In short, the family circle is a world in miniature, with its own habits, its own interests, and its own ties, largely independent of the great world that lies outside. When the family is of such ...
— Lighted to Lighten: The Hope of India • Alice B. Van Doren
... Mr. Chute's frank, and only happened entirely to forget it, but will write soon; and my father wishes Edward to send him a memorandum in your next letter of the price of the hops. The tables are come, and give general contentment. I had not expected that they would so perfectly suit the fancy of us all three, or that we should so well agree in the disposition of them; but nothing except their own surface can have been smoother. The two ends ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh
... rule that most clannish and suspicious of Mediterranean peoples first called forth the administrative powers of Sir Gilbert Elliot, first Earl of Minto. Acting as Viceroy of Corsica, he sought to promote contentment by promulgating an excellent constitution and administrative reforms. But, being hampered from the outset by the factious behaviour of Paoli, he, with the consent of the Cabinet, deported him to England in the autumn of 1795. An equally ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... near; the north-west wind sways the tops of spruce and fir with a sweet cool sighing; again and again, farther away and yet farther, an owl is hooting; the chill that ushers in the dawn is still remote. And Maria, in perfect contentment, rests upon the step, watching the ruddy beam from her fire-flickering, disappearing, ...
— Maria Chapdelaine - A Tale of the Lake St. John Country • Louis Hemon
... person; she contemplated herself in her heavy stuffs with a sort of intoxication, and this satisfaction continued when she descended the stairs to cast her redoubtable eye on the salon, the dinner-table, and the boudoir. She would then walk about with the naive contentment of the rich,—who remember at all moments that they are rich and will never want for anything. She looked at her eternal furniture, her curiosities, her lacquers, and said to herself that all these ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac
... over spacious homes which they built of clay and native wood and furnished with the luxuries they brought with them in the ships. They reared lovely daughters and strong, hot-blooded sons; and they grew rich in cattle and in contentment, in this paradise which Nature had set apart for her own playground and which the zeal of the padres had found and claimed in the name of God ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... Darpan the educated natives looked as the means of bringing the oppression of their own countrymen to the knowledge of the public and the authorities. Government found it most useful for contradicting silly rumours and promoting contentment if not loyalty. The paper gave a new development to the Bengali language as well as to the moral and political education of ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith
... things. Lead me whither thou pleasest. Let me act what part thou wilt, either of a public or a private person, of a rich man or a beggar.'"[845] "Show those qualities," says Marcus Aurelius, "which God hath put in thy power—sincerity, gravity, endurance of labor, aversion to pleasure, contentment with thy portion and with few things, benevolence, frankness, no love of superfluity, freedom from ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... others, similarly circumstanced, a portion of that spirit of cheerfulness, and that resolute determination to make the most of things, which, after thirty years of activity and enjoyment in foreign climes, have landed me in perfect contentment at home. ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... lashing the two oars to the iron shroud, and took infinite pains to incline the boat over to that side so as to be turned away from the wind and screened from the tide, and I therefore weighted her down by placing the dingey and heavy anchor on the lee gunwale, and then with misplaced contentment proceeded to cook my dinner. At a solemn pause in the repast, the yawl, without other warning than a loud splash, perversely turned over to the wrong side, with deck to sea and wind, and every single thing exactly the contrary of what was proper. I had just time ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... thinking of all the more brilliant things I might have said and the more expedient things I might have done. And that's the scene which has been working like yeast at the bottom of my sodden batter of contentment, making me feel that I'd swell up and burst, if all that crazy ferment couldn't find some relief in expression. So after three long years and more of silence I'm turning back to this, the journal of one irresponsible old Chaddie ...
— The Prairie Child • Arthur Stringer
... so young a woman, and only anticipating her second confinement, had gone through very nearly the same experience as herself with regard to the behavior and fundamental character of the monthly nurse,—she expressed great contentment to her husband, when they drove away, at leaving Tom with a woman who, in spite of her youth, seemed quite sensible and motherly, and asked advice as ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... father was suffering less, that he was convalescing, and that he appeared to be happy, she experienced a contentment which she did not even perceive, so gently and naturally had it come. Then, it was in the month of March, the days were growing longer, the winter was departing, the winter always bears away with it a portion of our sadness; then came April, ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... tradition have left their imprint upon the sex to the effect that single life is not an end in itself, and that somehow it needs must change. Of course, many a spinster has gone to a satisfied grave in complete contentment over a life of spinsterhood. But there is nothing to prevent the question from arising, especially when there is an ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... dignity and fortune. They were moderate, conciliatory, and firm. They were models for rulers for all subsequent ages. There were, of course, exceptions, but the small number of riots and rebellions shows the contentment of the people, for they were not ground down by oppressive laws and exactions, until their spirit was broken. How munificent were the emperors to such cities as Athens and Alexandria! Athens was the seat of learning and culture, to the very end of the empire. Arts and literature and science ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... remarked, it may be that "He travels fastest who travels alone"; but speed was not the only thing he was after. So the next day, babies, bundles, baggage, and parents went down the Rhine, almost through Heidelberg, to Munich, with such joy and contentment in our hearts as we could not describe. All those days of unhappy searchings Carl had been through must have sunk deep, for in his last days of fever he would tell me of a form of delirium in which he searched again, with a heart ...
— An American Idyll - The Life of Carleton H. Parker • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... be—always an eyesore. The truly thrifty homemaker will wait until she can afford to buy something genuinely good, and then buy it with the conviction that she is laying up treasures of future happiness and contentment. The "good" piece is exactly what it claims to be, without pretense or artificiality, of hardwood of course, of simple construction, and graceful, artistic lines, its few decorations ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... call to supper with alacrity. Possibly he thought he would be the first one at the table, but Cobb's twins were in their places when he entered the room. 'Zekiel came in next, and Quincy's quick eye discerned that there was a look of quiet contentment on his face which had not ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin
... will find In that sweet life more solid joys, More true contentment to the mind, Than ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... who has served his country nobly, is quite fit, in soldierly fashion, to grapple single-handed with any difficulty he may encounter; but he is in hopes that the flag may yield its residual virtue to the contentment of some one or other ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... of happiness as Marcia's steps fell in with his; the sense of contentment and well-being which her mere presence always afforded him seemed the more soothing and potent this afternoon than ever before. Since yesterday, there had run high in his veins the fever of acquisition, and Ydo's personality had disturbed and stimulated until she had wrought ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... thoughts in an idle person; the soul is contaminated . . . Thus much I dare boldly say: he or she that is idle, be they of what condition they will, never so rich, so well allied, fortunate, happy—let them have all things in abundance, all felicity that heart can wish and desire, all contentment—so long as he, or she, or they, are idle, they shall never be pleased, never well in body or mind, but weary still, sickly still, vexed still, loathing still, weeping, sighing, grieving, suspecting, offended with the world, with every object, wishing themselves ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... the Green Forest came Old Granny Fox, and she was grinning, for once more she had fooled Bowser the Hound and now could take a nap in peace. Still grinning, she turned around two or three times to make herself comfortable and then, with a sigh of contentment, curled up for a sun-nap, and in a few minutes was asleep. And just a little way off behind the pine boughs sat Farmer Brown's boy holding his terrible gun and grinning. At last he had caught Old ...
— Old Granny Fox • Thornton W. Burgess
... happy. The old Mormon's hint did not disturb him; even the thought of Snap Naab did not return to trouble his contentment. The full present was sufficient for Hare, and his joy bubbled over, bringing smiles to August's grave face. Never had a summer afternoon in the oasis been so fair. The green fields, the red walls, the blue sky, all seemed drenched in ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... all true and useful knowledge; mere secular education will but probably tend to make a poor lad more cunning and maybe a more clever rogue; but not necessarily a good, industrious, and loyal citizen, as religion must do; then poverty even might be borne with contentment and some sense of happiness. A single reflection on the present condition of irreligious France should ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... same circumstances, as I would compare the offense of a parricide or a fratricide with that of a mere commonplace murderer. Such a war would be plus quam civile bellum. Which of us two could take a thrashing from the other and afterward go about our business with contentment? ...
— Volume 2 • Anthony Trollope
... his hand on Willie's shoulder, saying kindly, 'My boy, I understand now why you have that smile; for you have learned a secret which few people know—the secret of contentment. I shall have to call you The Contented Boy.' And with that, he ...
— A Hive of Busy Bees • Effie M. Williams
... settled upon him, and he put down his coffee cup abruptly; the contentment in his surroundings vanished. Lee wanted to be somewhere else, see something different, not so—so tranquil, so complacently delivered to the uneventful. Fanny, he told himself resentfully, would be satisfied to sit exactly where she was for a year. She met his fleet ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... what he could for his friend, and it was through his help that Essex was set free. But even then, Bacon wrote to the Earl, "I confess I love some things much better than I love your lordship, as the Queen's service, her quiet and contentment, her honour, her favour, the good of my country, and the like. Yet I love few persons better than yourself, both for gratitude's sake, and for your ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... as for a man's mind to be raised above the confusion of things, where he may have the prospect of the order of nature and error of man? But is this a view of delight only and not of discovery? of contentment and not of benefit? Shall he not as well discern the riches of nature's warehouse as the beauty of her shop? Is truth ever barren? Shall he not be able thereby to produce worthy effects, and to endow the life of man with infinite commodities?"[51] ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... Raleigh strongly objects to. In her alembicated style she says to Cecil, 'I hope for my sake you will rather draw for Walter towards the east than help him forward toward the sunset, if any respect to me or love to him be not forgotten. But every month hath his flower and every season his contentment, and you great councillors are so full of new councils, as you are steady in nothing, but we poor souls that have bought sorrow at a high price, desire, and can be pleased with, the same misfortune we hold, fearing alterations will but multiply misery, of which we have already ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse
... himself, "if I must relinquish all my gay expectations, let me at least have the satisfaction of clanking my chains so as to interrupt the repose of my adversary; and let me search in my own breast for that peace and contentment, which I have not been able to find in all the scenes of my success. In being detached from the world, I shall be delivered from folly and ingratitude, as well as exempted from an expense, which I should have found it very difficult, if not impracticable, ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... Majesty. They are many, and not all can be content, even when ruled by so wise and just a King. In every land and in every age there are those who rebel against the laws, and the protests of the few are ever heard above the contentment of the many." ...
— Mother Goose in Prose • L. Frank Baum
... glimpses, light and even fantastic glimpses, of a world that is really alien to Dickens. It is so alien that he can almost entirely enjoy it. For no man can entirely enjoy that which he loves; contentment is always unpatriotic. The difference can indeed be put with approximate perfection in one phrase. In Italy he was on a holiday; in America he was on a tour. But indeed Dickens himself has quite sufficiently conveyed the difference in the two phrases ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... Veronique, lying on the bed, followed them with a look of such inward contentment that she seemed, to every eye, no longer the same woman. On her face was the candid and virtuous expression of the pure young girl such as she had been in her parents' home. The dawn of eternal life was already whitening her brow and glorifying her face with its celestial ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac
... sounds adventurous. Yes, my love, I will shop with you on Thursday—if all goes well at Windsor to-morrow—with all the contentment in the world. (They kiss.) Now go to bed; and presently I will come and read ...
— Angels & Ministers • Laurence Housman
... had fallen naturally upon him to care for her, guard her against damp, prevent her from lifting objects beyond her strength. These continuous, small attentions held an important place in his existence—he thought about her in a mind devoted substantially to himself, and it brought him a glow of contentment, a pleasant feeling of ministration and importance. It had not occurred to him that Clare might grow worse, that she might, in fact, die. The idea filled him with sudden dismay. His heart contracted with a sharp hurt. "The ...
— Mountain Blood - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... castaways were filled with contentment as their stomachs were filled with food, and so busily did they devote themselves to eating, drinking, and sleeping that they forgot all about ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren
... gen'eral. Sep'rate " sep'arate. Mis'ries " mis'eries. Dif'frence " diff'erence. Ex'lent " ex'cellent. Comp'ny " com'pany. Liv'in " liv'ing. Lenth'en " length'en. Chastisemunt " chastisement. Bereavemunt " bereavement. Contentmunt " contentment. Offis " office. Hevun " heaven. Curosity " curiosity. Absolut ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... of the little valley, which four days ago was smiling with all the health of nature and the contentment of industrious man, is waxing pestiferous with the awful odor of decaying human bodies. Buzzards, invited by their disgusting instinct, gather for a promised feast, and sit and glower on neighboring perches or else circle round and round in the blue empyrean over the location of unfriended corpses, ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... curious mental tension. She was inspired by a sense of renunciation—of self-sacrifice. It seemed to her that some great work to do, something which should occupy every moment, and all her powers and thoughts, was her only hope of contentment. What it might be, what it ought to be, she had not conceived. Was it not offered now? Horrible, repulsive, degrading—yes, but was it not so much the worthier? Here stood the man she had loved in all the prime and power of his youth, full of hope, and beauty, and vigor—the ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... them, and there is another, on the summit of which appears a single tombstone, as if there were something natural in making these hills the repositories of the dead. A question of old H——— led to Mr. Jenkins's dissertation on this subject, to the great contentment of a large circle round the bar-room fireside ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... would run away if left free were groundless. He made his way to my saddle, which lay on the ground near by, crawled under it, turned round beneath it, and thrust his little head from beneath the arch of the horn and lay down with a look of contentment, and also with an air which said, "I'll take care of this saddle. I'd like to see any ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills |
