"Solemnity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... who up to this time had been quite affable, now seemed suddenly to be caught by the solemnity of the place, and stood like a man at the funeral ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... patient saints, Our one white day of Innocence hath past, Though somewhat draggled at the skirt. So be it. The snowdrop only, flowering through the year, Would make the world as blank as Winter-tide. Come—let us gladden their sad eyes, our Queen's And Lancelot's, at this night's solemnity With all the kindlier ...
— Idylls of the King • Alfred, Lord Tennyson
... praises of the Christian Church. More often than in any other Gospel we find such expressions as "glorifying God," "praising God," "blessing God." Again, St. Luke, in choosing incidents from the life of home, and more especially in choosing incidents in which women are prominent, gives a new solemnity to a life which men had hitherto despised. We always think of the Blessed Virgin as "highly favoured," of Martha "cumbered about much serving" (x. 40), of the widow with the two mites, of the daughters of Jerusalem weeping on the way of the cross (xxiii. 28), of the double joy of Elisabeth ...
— The Books of the New Testament • Leighton Pullan
... month of the 2d year of Shoho, Sogoro having been convicted of a heinous crime, a scaffold was erected at Ewaradai, and the councillor who resided at Yedo and the councillor who resided on the estate, with the other officers, proceeded to the place in all solemnity. Then the priests of Tokoji, in the village of Sakenaga, followed by coffin-bearers, took their places in front of the ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... rain fell; and, falling, it was rain, but, having fallen, it was blood. And I stood in the morass among the tall lilies, and the rain fell upon my head—and the lilies sighed one unto the other in the solemnity of ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... of South African nature, its silence, its loneliness, its drear solemnity, have not been without their influence upon the mind and temper of the European settler. The most peculiar and characteristic type that the country has produced is the Boer of the eastern plateau, the offspring of those Dutch Africanders ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce
... in the same drowsy, monotonous tone in which the church responses are usually made. The scene was altogether curious and striking; the progress of the procession was everywhere marked by uncovered heads and signs of sympathy and respect; but in spite of its attempted solemnity, there was a holiday appearance about it which jarred sadly with its real ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... each, a liveried servant carried a torch which gave him to be distinctly seen. And the flashing of gold on their persons was wonderful to the spectator. Why not? This rare and anointed body was the Church going in solemnity to assist the ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... approval your particular views about the Papacy, or about Moral Inability, or about Pelagianism or the Patripassian heresy. Indicate that you will not be pumped: and you may convey, in a kindly and polite way, that you really don't care a rush what he thinks of you. The other course is, with deep solemnity and an unchanged countenance, to horrify your inspector by avowing the most fearful views. Tell him, that, on long reflection, you are prepared to advocate the revival of Cannibalism. Say that probably something may be ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... those grave fathers of the nation. History and fiction often conspire to portray them as always walking with solemnity, talking with deep seriousness, and looking upon all mortals and all things with chilling gloom; but, after all, they seem, in domestic life at least, to have gone about their daily round of duties and pleasures in much the same spirit as we, their descendants, work and play. As Wharton in ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... looking particularly clean, and Elizabeth Fry had commenced reading a Psalm, when the whole of this party entered this already crowded room. Her reading was thus interrupted for a short time. She looked calmly on the approaching gentlemen, who, soon perceiving the solemnity of her occupation, stood still midst the multitude, whilst Elizabeth Fry resumed her office and the women their quietude. In an impressive tone she told them she never permitted any trifling circumstance to interrupt the very solemn and important engagement of ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman
... any heart could have been touched of that cruel multitude, they would have felt some compassion for the sweet young face of the English girl, trying so meekly to do all that she was ordered, her face quite white, yet so full of sad gentleness, her grey eyes, a little dilated by the very solemnity of her position, fixed with the intent look of innocent maidenhood on the stern face of Justice Hathorn. And thus they stood in silence, one breathless minute. Then they were bidden to say the Lord's Prayer. Lois went through it as if alone in her cell; but, as she had done alone in her cell ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... Despite the solemnity of the occasion smothered giggles were heard following Tommy Thompson's remark that had reached the ear of every person at the ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls Under Canvas • Janet Aldridge
... scant arm's length behind by that infuriated cow. Did any one help him? Not any. Every man of that crew was hanging weak from laughter to the horn of his saddle or the top of the fence. The preternatural solemnity had broken to little bits. Men came running from the bunk-house, only to go into spasms outside, to roll over and over on the ground, clutching handfuls of herbage in the agony ...
— The Mountains • Stewart Edward White
... the heart of man. Balder had looked forward to condemnation with a wholesome solemnity which cheered while it chastened him. But the thought of acquittal, and at Gnulemah's hands, appalled him. The implicit consequences to humanity seemed more formidable than the worst which condemnation could bring upon himself. So much had he lately changed his point of view, ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... not," said the Doctor, with solemnity,—"never, with my permission. Go to your home, woman, and pray God to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various
... and, moreover, my own temper was hot; and it is likely that I should have strode on with little scruple if I had not been interrupted. But in the temple which marked the boundary, there was old Zaemon waiting; and he, with due solemnity of words, and with the whole of some ancient ritual ordained for that purpose, sought dispensation from the High Gods for my trespass, and would not give me way till he was through with ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... the Whirlwind's plan was readily acceded to, and a camp on the Platte, known as Labonte's, was the point designated as the rendezvous. At that place their war-like ceremonies were to be celebrated with great dignity and solemnity; a thousand warriors, it is declared, were to be sent out into the enemy's country; but the thing ended in smoke. True, a great many Indians gathered there, but they went on a big buffalo hunt instead of ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... grief and sorrow. They closed the last scene of this mournful tragedy in obsequies of their lamented general, and of the other gentlemen who fell with him, and interred them in the church of Blair of Atholl with a real funeral solemnity, there not being present one single person who did not ...
— Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers and Other Poems • W.E. Aytoun
... great solemnity. In order to provide opportunity for observing all the ceremonies prescribed by the church, they are so arranged that the ceremonies corresponding to the commemoration of the death of Christ are begun on Thursday at noon and the celebration of the resurrection on Saturday at noon, ...
— Santo Domingo - A Country With A Future • Otto Schoenrich
... which fissure the pali. Every now and then some scarlet tropic bird flashed across the shadow, but it was a very lifeless and a very silent scene. The arches, buttresses, and columns suggest a temple, and the deep tone of the fall is as organ music. It is all beauty, solemnity, and worship. ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... beautiful and in perfect order, she wept with rapture. Late on the last night of the year 1817, Carl wrote in a diary these words; they show what depths there were in the soul and what heights in the ambition of one whose youth and training and early recklessness had promised so little of solidity and solemnity. ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... the flesh, and whose souls, absorbed in heavenly contemplation, glide insensibly from out their last ecstasy into eternal bliss. Some time he lay thus with closed eyes, putting up a silent prayer to God; then he bade them light the spacious room as for a great solemnity, and gave a sign to the two persons who stood, one at the head, the other at the foot of the bed. The two folding doors opened, and the whole of the royal family, with the queen at their head and the chief barons following, took their ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... of Carthage, whose stormy episcopate closed with the crown of martyrdom in the latter half of the third century, began his treatise on the Nativity thus: "The much wished-for and long expected Nativity of Christ is come, the famous solemnity is come"—expressions which indicate the desire with which the Church looked forward to the festival, and the fame which its celebrations had acquired in the popular mind. And in later times, after the fulness of festivity at Christmas had ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... allowed by the austere, or generally recognised by the jovial. By laughter man is distinguished from the beasts, but the cares and sorrows of life have all but deprived man of this distinguishing grace, and degraded him to a brutal solemnity. Then comes (alas, how rarely!) a genius such as Falstaff's, which restores the power of laughter and transforms the stolid brute into man. This genius approaches nearly to the divine power of creation, and we may truly say, 'Some for less were deified.' It ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell
... noble order in question was so far very appropriately connected with the assumption of a sovereignty partly feudal, as it formed one of the most splendid feudal distinctions. It was conferred with great solemnity, among the Franks and Saxons, long prior to the Conquest; at which period our first William is shown by Mr. Anstey, to have been in the habit of bestowing it both in his Norman and English dominions. The candidate for that honour was required to keep his ...
— Coronation Anecdotes • Giles Gossip
... every instance by institutions that were more or less popular. The history of the world cannot, probably, furnish another instance of the settlement of the fundamental contract of a great nation under circumstances of so much obvious justice. This gives unusual solemnity and authority to the Constitution of 1787, and invests it with additional claims to our admiration ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... gnawed at it incessantly, and his usually florid complexion had deteriorated to a muddy pallor. Black mufti did not suit the handsome martial figure, and there is no dwelling so wearisome as a house of mourning, when the servants move about on tiptoe, wearing faces of funereal solemnity, and the afternoon tea-tray is carried in in state, like the corpse of a domestic usage on its way to the cemetery, with the silver spirit-kettle bubbling behind it as chief mourner. But, as the elder son, ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... will have very little of that, Mill, as it is, for it will be very, very quiet. I should hate a fashionable wedding, and feel that it took away half the solemnity of the service to have one's thoughts taken up with dress and furbelows. Edward wants to be married very soon, in two months, if possible, for he says he has waited long enough for a home, and there is no reason for delay. We are quite sure of our own minds, and there will be no difficulty in ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... mounted with his comrade to the adjacent height, which overlooks both Harteneck and Neckarweihingen; and there in a truly poetic effusion he pronounced his malediction on the creamless region, bestowing with the same solemnity his blessing on the one which had afforded him that savoury refreshment.' Friedrich von Schillers Leben ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... the colonels, the captains, the women, the children, and the dumb brutes; took Buffalo Bill, and all his scouts; took the garrison—to the last man; and in forty-eight hours the Indian encampment was hers, illustrious old Thunder-Bird and all. Do I seem to have lost my solemnity, my gravity, my poise, my dignity? You would lose your own, in my circumstances. Mother, you never saw such a winning little devil. She is all energy, and spirit, and sunshine, and interest in everybody and everything, and pours ...
— A Horse's Tale • Mark Twain
... dauntless monk; but he received them with unshaken calmness, replying to all with dignity and wisdom. His bearing was firm and courageous. His pale, thin face, marked with the traces of toil and illness, wore a kindly and even joyous expression. The solemnity and deep earnestness of his words gave him a power that even his enemies could not wholly withstand. Both friends and foes were filled with wonder. Some were convinced that a divine influence attended him; others declared, as had the Pharisees ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White
... was appalled at the boldness and daring of my fellow-students, who had actually taken possession of the Parkville Liberal Institute, and purposed to mete out justice to me and to Bill Poodles. There was a certain kind of solemnity in the proceedings, which was not without its effect upon me. My companions were thoroughly in earnest, and the affair was ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic
... breezy background of blue sky and sea, contrasting as strangely with the dark solemnity of the other portraits as did the figure itself in its incongruous sailor dress, the face of the eighth baronet looked down in melancholy gravity upon the group ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... turned her back and began to plough her way across the ferns towards the dark wood. Joyce, watching her, saw her go at first with wrath, for she had been stung, and then with compunction. The plump baby was so small in the brooding solemnity of the pines, thrusting indefatigably along, buried to the waist in ferns. Her sleek, brown head had a devoted look; the whole of her seemed to go with so sturdy an innocence towards those peopled and uncanny glooms. Joyce rose to her knees to ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... to take breath. I did not permit him to exert himself further; but, without loss of time, returned the post-house, applied to my medicine-chest, and prepared a dose of calomel, which was administered that evening with due solemnity. I then retired ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... himself, therefore, Napoleon could do nothing better at the Champ de Mai, than what he did: namely, to endeavour to conceal the emptiness of the day under the pomp of a religious and military solemnity, calculated to move the heart, and strengthen by fresh bands the union, already subsisting between him, ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... a grin and nodded, as though he thought the mode of execution rather a good one; then, recollecting suddenly that any mode of slaying innocent men was inconsistent with his character as a convert to Christianity, he cast a glance of awful solemnity at Waroonga, and ...
— The Madman and the Pirate • R.M. Ballantyne
... by their confidence his zeal rewarded. None had the influence of Truth discarded Who first professed by it to be made free, And 'twas their wish, since nothing now retarded, To be baptized with due solemnity, That those who disbelieved ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... PODBURY). You great owl, you came a cropper that time! [He and PODBURY indulge in a subdued bear-fight up the stairs, after which they enter the Upper Hall in a state of preternatural solemnity. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, January 16, 1892 • Various
... illiterate Mexican adventurers, though it had once been settled by a thrifty people whose stage of culture was that of the Pueblo Indians of to-day, and who had vanished, nobody knows how many centuries ago. Over it all hovered a distinct atmosphere of antiquity and the solemnity ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz
... term. The sadness of human lot, the power and mysterious dealings of the gods, their terrible and inscrutable wrath and jealousy (aga and pthonos), their certain vengeance upon sinners, all the more fearful it delayed.—-Such are the poet's constant themes, delivered with strange solemnity and impressiveness in the the songs, especially in the Oresteia. And at times, particularly in the Trilogy, in his reference to the divine power of Zeus, he almost approaches a stern and sombre monotheism. "One God above all, who directs all, who is the cause ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... island, and considered himself firmly fixed upon its throne. The abbey thus raised, was, during the whole of the monarch's life, honored with his especial favor; and at his death, he bequeathed it other lands, together with his sceptre, the crown he wore upon occasions of the highest solemnity, his hand of justice, a cup made of precious stone, his golden candlesticks, and all the royal ornaments which usually appertain to the crown. Still further to manifest his gracious regard, he directed that the abbatial church should ...
— Architectural Antiquities of Normandy • John Sell Cotman
... simplest terms by these old words, 'Joseph died, and all his brethren and all that generation'—and 'the children of Israel were fruitful and increased abundantly.' So the wholesome lesson of mortality is stripped of much of its sadness, and retains all its pathos, solemnity, and ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... chillun!" said Katie, in a voice of such awful solemnity that Ishmael again smiled at what he was inclined to characterize as the absurdity of believing ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... All began that very charming air at the moment. Sobs and sighs stole in between the pauses of the harmony. Their rich and practised voices gave it the sweetness and solemnity of a hymn. Fine eyes were lifted to heaven; fine faces were buried in their clasped hands; and the whole finished like the subsidence ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... the new ideas of matrimony. I remember one pretty pouting mulatto about eighteen who came with a tall, powerful negro to the office for a marriage license. They were married in the church, and some few words were spoken of the solemnity of the bond between them. In about two weeks the bride burst into my office one morning, followed by her husband. 'Mars' Cap'n,' she said, 'can't I go home ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... the Colonel proposes they shall solemnly BURN their old regimentals. And they do it, the Officers of them, SUB DIO, perhaps in the Prince's garden, stripping successively in the "Temple" there, with such degree of genial humor, loud laughter, or at least boisterous mock-solemnity, as may be in them. This is a true incident of the Prince's history, though ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... earth was heaped upon his mortal remains in silent solemnity, and the ashes of a braver or a better man will never repose in ...
— What I Saw in California • Edwin Bryant
... around upon his audience. They stood, or sat, or reclined upon the grass, as seemed good to each, with the departing sunshine falling obliquely over them, and mingling its subdued cheerfulness with the solemnity of a grove of ancient trees, beneath and amid the boughs of which the golden rays were constrained to pass. In another direction was seen the Great Stone Face, with the same cheer, combined with the same solemnity, in ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... exchequer, until there should be tithes and ecclesiastical revenues to maintain themselves. Moreover, he provided whatever else was necessary for the service and decoration of the church, and for the divine worship which is celebrated there with great solemnity and display. Don Fray Domingo de Salazar took Antonio Sedeno and Alonso Sanchez, both priests and grave members of the Society of Jesus, with him. They were the first to establish that order in the Filipinas, which, since that time, has been steadily growing, to the great profit ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... is in any way disappointing, the interior more than compensates for its shortcomings. The general impression on entering the church is one of simple dignity and solemnity. The great massiveness of the structure and absence of elaborate ornament no doubt contribute to this feeling. The pious builders of old have certainly contrived to stamp on their work their own feeling of awe in the presence of the All-Powerful and Eternal ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Durham - A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Episcopal See • J. E. Bygate
... condition of the youthful mind, and in such a way as shall be calculated to interest, as well as to instruct. A cold and formal exhortation, or even an apparently earnest one, delivered in a tone of affected solemnity, will produce no good effect. Perhaps I ought not to say it will produce no good effect: for good does sometimes result, as a sort of accidental consequence, from almost any thing. I mean it will have no effectual tendency to do good. You must vary your method ...
— The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... and those that preceded it, were undoubtedly sufficient to testify to the nation the liberal disposition of Napoleon: but no speech from the throne had yet declared with solemnity the ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... time for deliberate reflection since the melancholy event took place. I have experienced a sufficient change of objects and country; the effect is the same. The wound is still recent, and so it will ever remain: indeed I cannot wish it otherwise. There is a rich and sacred solemnity in my sorrows, sir, which I would not exchange for the most splendid acquirements of wealth, or the most dignified ...
— Alonzo and Melissa - The Unfeeling Father • Daniel Jackson, Jr.
... sexton had been going to see his brother-in-law, nine miles distant, but promptly postponed the visit for a few days, that there might be the regular professional hand present to toll the bell in a note of due fulness and solemnity; an attempt by a deputy, on a previous occasion of his absence, having degenerated into a miserable stammering clang that was a ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy
... forest is nature's expression of solemnity and solitude. Sunlight, rivers, cascades, people, music, laughter, or dancing could not make it gay. With its unceasing reverberations and its eternal shadows, it is as awful and ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... with solemnity, "the light shining in the darkness, and the darkness comprehending it not—six candles, and only the up-turned face of the dead, and the down-turned face of the sleeping! I seemed to look into the heart of things, and see ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... The civilians of Ladysmith join with the troops in expressions of respectful sympathy to Lord Dufferin and his family. To-night Lord Ava's body was buried in the little cemetery, a scene impressive in its simple solemnity. Brigadier-General Hamilton with his staff; Colonel Rhodes; Major King, A.D.C., representing the Headquarters Staff, with Sir George White's personal aide-de-camp; several officers of the Imperial Light Horse, among whom Lord Ava was wounded; Captain Tilney of Lord Ava's old ...
— Four Months Besieged - The Story of Ladysmith • H. H. S. Pearse
... iron gate and slipped in. All was as before in the Ghetto. The same sacred hush in court and square, accentuated by the rumble of prayer from the synagogues, the gathering dusk lending a touch of added solemnity. ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... of March. Though in that genial climate the weather was serene and mild, a rousing fire was found very grateful in protecting them from the chill of the night air. With the fading twilight the stars shone down brightly upon them, and, surrounded by the silence and solemnity of the prairie and the forest, they were soon ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott
... you considered yourself committed to all this solemnity before your time, or willy-nilly, as the children say. What a comical idea to hang one's self up in a store in this fashion. I must have one of these. Are you going to keep yours?" And as he spoke he reached forward and possessed himself of one of the cards. "Rather odd things to be found ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... head—with heavy solemnity] 'Tes my belief there's no other way to du, but to elect a chairman to call a meetin'; an' then for that meetin' ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... their lower slopes, and white mists filled the valley, out of which the song of the river rose in long reverberations. Geoffrey and Helen leaned on the veranda balustrade, both silent, for the solemnity of the mountains impressed them, ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... process of tidying up), a little bowed, and receding from the world not because of weariness or misanthropy but for other reasons that cannot be helped: because the leaves fall, the water flows, the clock ticks with that horrid pitiless solemnity which you must have observed in the ticking of the hall clock at home. For reasons like that. Yes! It recedes. And this was the chance to afford one more view of it—even ...
— Notes on Life and Letters • Joseph Conrad
... are honorable; they are virtuous; their cultivation is not merely innocent pleasure, it is incumbent duty. Obedient to their dictates, you, my fellow-citizens, have instituted and paid frequent observance to this annual solemnity. And what event of weightier intrinsic importance, or of more extensive consequences, was ever selected for this ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... the solemnity of the king's birth-day, when he is publicly weighed, to which I went. I was conducted into a beautiful garden, in the middle of which was a great square pond or tank, set all round with trees and flowers, and in the middle was a pavilion or pleasure-house, under ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr
... the Bampton Lectures of 1866. The scene and the sermon can never be forgotten. Prayers and hymns and thanksgivings for Founder and Benefactors had been duly performed, and we had listened with becoming solemnity to that droll chapter about "Such as found out musical tunes, and recited verses in writing." When the preacher entered the pulpit, his appearance instantly attracted attention. We had heard vaguely of him ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... just quitted by the adventurous passage of the rainy yard.... And now they were amid oily odours in a large raftered workshop, full of machines.... The printing-works!... An enormous but very deferential man saluted them with majestic solemnity. He was the foreman, and labelled by his white apron as an artisan, but his gigantic bulk—he would have outweighed the pair of them—and his age set him somehow over them, so that they were a couple ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... in England is not so speedy certainly nor so horrid, but it is conducted with a degree of Solemnity that must impress the mind most forcibly. I did not see the two who suffered in the evening, the morning's business was quite ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley
... modern sings hymns, that is he flatters. There is still a great deal of the charlatanry of the magician in the construction of the houses of prayer, with the sunlight shut out and only filtering through the leaded and multi-colored panes, the semidarkness, the solemnity, the rise and swell of the organ; all things combined to overcome the senses, to play upon the emotions, and to subdue ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... scarlet, the pope hunted up four false witnesses who declared that Caesar was the son of Count Ferdinand of Castile; who was, as we know, that valuable person Don Manuel Melchior, and who played the father's part with just as much solemnity as he had ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Frenchmen filled the street beneath the windows of THE NEW YORK TIMES office, where I was at work. They sang the "Marseillaise" for two hours, with a solemn hatred of their national enemy sounding in every note. The solemnity changed to a wild passion as the night wore on. Finally, cuirassiers of the guard rode through the street to disperse the mob. It ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... lives, and died in their professors' chairs honored by all men. For achievements of this sort we need hardly use as strong language as Emerson does in describing contemporary literature: "It exhibits a vast carcass of tradition every year with as much solemnity as a ...
— Emerson and Other Essays • John Jay Chapman
... the gray-green mesa with its green-gray rocks, they marched with imposing solemnity, importance, and directness of purpose. Some frolicsome Calves, playing along-side the trail, grew sober and walked behind their mothers as the river flat was reached. The old Cow that headed the procession sniffed suspiciously ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... my ice-glazed hat and jacket, I seated myself near the door, and turning sideways was surprised to see Queequeg near me. Affected by the solemnity of the scene, there was a wondering gaze of incredulous curiosity in his countenance. This savage was the only person present who seemed to notice my entrance; because he was the only one who could not read, and, therefore, was not reading ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... and he saw her eyes fill with tears. "With me," he went on, "you will be as safe—as safe"—and even in his ardor he hesitated a moment for a comparison—"as safe," he said, with a kind of simple solemnity, "as in your ...
— The American • Henry James
... uncovered, the priestly stole hanging over his arm, his hands holding aloft the tall candle of virgin wax, while the Dean followed closely with feeble steps, looking frail and worn, but with a grave, sweet solemnity on his face. It was a perfectly still morning, and as they slowly paced along, the flame burnt steadily with little flickering, while the pure, delicately-coloured sky overhead was becoming every moment lighter, and only the larger stars were visible. ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... vicar, with more than common solemnity—'criminal, I should say—criminal! Not only is it making a fool of the boy, but it is despising the gifts of Providence, and teaching him to trample them under ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... more glancing upward, as if she imagined herself to have made some declaration of a religious nature, shook her head with much solemnity. ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... be some hidden and vital relation between these three words, Salvation, Neglect, and Escape—some reasonable, essential, and indissoluble connection. Why are these words so linked together as to weight this clause with all the authority and solemnity of ...
— Natural Law in the Spiritual World • Henry Drummond
... treaty were exchanged with unusual solemnity. For this purpose the Tycoon had accredited three of his most distinguished subjects as envoys extraordinary and ministers plenipotentiary, who were received and treated with marked distinction and kindness, both by the Government and people of the United States. There is every reason to believe ...
— State of the Union Addresses of James Buchanan • James Buchanan
... smile, which instantly gave way to an air of funereal solemnity. 'I shall particularly expect Mr Whish,' he continued. 'Mr Whish, I trust you understand ...
— The Ebb-Tide - A Trio And Quartette • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... call him Brett) who had an almost dog-like way of watching his master. Was this but a calculated touch in a merely aesthetic whole? Brett was tall and slender, and his movements were those of a greyhound under perfect self-control. Baldness at the temples enhanced the solemnity of his thin smooth face. It is more than twenty years since first I saw him; and for a long period I saw him often, both in town and in country. Against the background of either house he was impeccable. Many butlers might be that. Brett's ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... venerable antiquities, which all deserve to be seen, a variety of figures in wax, and in cases with glazed doors, are shewn as curiosities to the stranger; but they ought to be removed, as disgraceful to the grandeur and solemnity of the other parts of the scene, and as a satire on the national taste, which can scarcely be excused, when such things are exhibited in ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... original, that they who have not given their time to the study of the old language, "must either find a true likeness of Chaucer exhibited in this version, or they will find it nowhere else." With great solemnity he says, "Thence I have imposed it on myself as a duty somewhat sacred to deviate from my original as little as possible in the sentiment, and have often in the language adopted his own expressions, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... name?" inquired Miss Tewksbury, with some degree of solemnity, as the boy deposited the pitcher ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... With some solemnity the door was shut, and a cane chair placed for the girl. Then Miss Bartlett said "So what is ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster
... obviated by polytheism. It is the agglomeration of its gods, the republic of them, that really constitutes its Divinity. The real God of Hellenic paganism is not so much Father Zeus (Jupiter) as the whole society of gods and demi-gods. Hence the solemnity of the invocation of Demosthenes when he invoked all the gods and all the goddesses: tois theohis euchomai pasi kahi pasais. And when the rationalizers converted the term god, theos, which is properly an adjective, a quality predicated of each one of the gods, into a substantive, ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... stock. At that moment poor Mr. Brown was very much to be pitied. He was a man of feeling, and even if his heart was not touched by his late loss, he knew what was due to decency. It behoved him now as a widower to forget the deceased lady's faults, and to put her under the ground with solemnity. This was done with the strictest propriety; and although he must, of course, have been thinking a good deal at that time as to whether he was to be a beggar or a rich man, nevertheless he conducted himself till after the funeral as though he hadn't a care on his mind, except ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... straight upward, and when the path failed, my way was marked by the wire of the telegraph that crosses to Belfort. As I rose I saw the forest before me grow grander. The pine branches came down from the trunks with a greater burden and majesty in their sway, the trees took on an appearance of solemnity, and the whole rank that faced me—for here the woods come to an even line and stand like an army arrested upon a downward march — seemed something unusual and gigantic. Nothing more helped this impression of awe ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... inordinate affection and from the fear of pain or death you will be free. Disenamoured of mundane things, you will live simply and unperturbed, in kindness and cheerfulness and in gratitude to Providence. Life will be to you as a feast or solemnity, and when it comes to a close, you will rise up saying, 'I have been well and nobly entertained, it is fit that I give place to ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... pronounced these words, he reverently kneeled upon the floor. His colleagues and the delegates of the churches followed his example. A deep solemnity fell upon the assembly. According to one account of the scene, even the Roman cardinals stood with uncovered heads while the Huguenot minister prayed. Catharine de' Medici joined with still greater devotion, while King Charles remained seated ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... inland to the great and rich city came back again with their report. Alas for visions of the Great Khan! The city turned out to be a village of fifty houses with twenty people in each house. The envoys had been received with great solemnity; and all the men "as well as the women" came to see them, and lodged them in a fine house. The chief people in the village came and kissed their hands and feet, hailing them as visitors from the skies, and seating them ...
— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young
... hero's head make bold, Illustrious mark! where pins are to be sold. What's the bent brow, or neck in thought reclin'd? The body's wisdom to conceal the mind. A man of sense can artifice disdain; As men of wealth may venture to go plain; And be this truth eternal ne'er forgot, Solemnity's a cover for a sot. I find the fool, when I behold the screen; For 'tis the wise man's interest to be seen. Hence, Chesterfield, that openness of heart, And just disdain for that poor mimic art; Hence (manly ...
— The Poetical Works of Edward Young, Volume 2 • Edward Young
... the importance of the occasion, and the solemnity of that assembly to which it was delivered, deserves great blame, was yet vouched for truth by the prince of Wales, who was present; and the king himself lent it, indirectly, his authority, by telling ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... Margaret died on board a ship in the harbor of Flensburg, at the age of fifty-nine, after an active and notable reign of thirty-seven years. Her funeral was attended with the greatest solemnity, and her corpse was brought to the Cathedral of Roeskilde, where Eric of Pomerania, her successor, in 1423, caused her likeness to be carved in alabaster. Her acts show her character. She displayed judiciousness united with ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... serious Humour, I very often walk by my self in Westminster Abbey; where the Gloominess of the Place, and the Use to which it is applied, with the Solemnity of the Building, and the Condition of the People who lye in it, are apt to fill the Mind with a kind of Melancholy, or rather Thoughtfulness, that is not disagreeable. I Yesterday pass'd a whole Afternoon in the Church-yard, the Cloysters, ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... saint, life-size, carved in wood, held in high veneration. On the 15th of September of that year, which is its festa, another image of wood is carried processionally with much pomp. Thirty persons, who had remained after the conclusion of the solemnity to pray before the ancient image, suddenly perceived it to move, as if alive. It came forward, then retreated, and turned towards the image of the Virgin of the Holy Rosary. The cry of "St. Dominic! St. Dominic! A miracle! a miracle!" burst from every lip. The wonderful news sped like lightning ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... set closely. Ludwell Cary might not know where all his shafts were striking, but Rand felt the sting. Fair fight in the courtroom,—that was one thing,—but this paper was wrought of sterner stuff. There was in it even a solemnity of warning. Rand's soul, that was in the grasp of Giant Two-Ways, writhed for a moment, then lay still again. With his characteristic short laugh, he shook off the feeling that he mistook for weakness, dismissed ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... not answer at once. He looked again at the sky and to right and left, thought a little, blinked.... Apparently he attached no little significance to his words, and to increase their value tried to pronounce them with deliberation and a certain solemnity. The expression of his face had the sharpness and staidness of old age, and the fact that his nose had a saddle-shaped depression across the middle and his nostrils turned upwards gave him a sly and ...
— The Witch and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... voice responds—the pithy epigram of the Characteristics, the Chesterfieldian grace in his advice "On the Conduct of Life," the palpitating movement with which he gives expression to his keen enjoyment of his sensual or intellectual existence, and the subdued solemnity of his reveries which sometimes remind us that he was writing in an age which had rediscovered Sir Thomas Browne. The following sentence proves how accurately he could catch the rhythm of the seventeenth century. "That ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... Soto," said the astrologer with great deliberation and solemnity of manner, "I think I can read the page of your destiny, even without such light as the stars can shed upon it. Be assured that the warning I give you does not come from an unearthly source. But if any supernatural confirmation of my words were needed, even on that score you might be satisfied. ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... great man died suddenly at the Council-Table, Whitehall, after a bustling life devoted to the public weal; and the 26th of May following, his remains were deposited with great solemnity in Westminster Abbey, his funeral sermon being preached by Dr. Abbot, his chaplain, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury. Besides this celebrated sermon of the primate's, in which he is very lavish in his praise, Lord Chancellor Bacon, and Sir Robert Naunton, bestow particular ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume I. • Theophilus Cibber
... corner, sat fascinated while the old gentlemen began their symposium. Another, making five, came in and joined them—the five had the end of the bar-parlour to themselves. Mr. Quarterpage made the punch with all due solemnity and ceremony; when it was ladled out each man lighted his pipe or took a cigar, and the tongues began to wag. Other folk came and went; the old gentlemen were oblivious of anything but their own talk. Now and then a young gentleman of the town dropped in to take his modest half-pint of bitter ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... of misfortune. He knew at once what date had been set for the consummation of Storch's sinister plot. He rose to his feet, shivering until his teeth chattered. He felt like a man invested with all the horrid solemnity of ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... voice, indicating solemnity, power, reverence, and dread. It is a near approach to one continuous tone of voice, but must not be confounded with monotony. Much of the reading we hear is monotonous in the extreme, while the judicious use of the monotone would sufficiently vary it, to render it ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... name the poor fellow once more, I must take my last leave of him; poor honest Friday! We buried him with all decency and solemnity possible, by putting him into a coffin, and throwing him into the sea; and I caused them to fire eleven guns for him: and so ended the life of the most grateful, faithful, honest, and most affectionate ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... solemnity, and as a soul-searching test for which the Twelve had been in unconscious preparation through many months of close and privileged companionship with their Lord, Jesus asked of them: "But whom say ye that I am?" Answering for all, but more particularly testifying as ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... explained away the Bulgarian massacres as a myth woven by the Western imagination, salvoes of cannon were heard, that proclaimed the birth of a new and most democratic constitution for the whole of the Turkish Empire. Safvet did justice to the solemnity of the occasion; the envoys of the Powers suppressed their laughter; and before long, Lord Salisbury showed his resentment at this display of oriental irony and stubbornness by ordering the British Fleet to ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... renounced the authority of the Pope, and declared that the Roman people constituted itself a free Republic. The resolution was conveyed to Berthier, who recognised the Roman Commonwealth, and made a procession through the city with the solemnity of an ancient triumph. The Pope shut himself up in the Vatican. His Swiss guard was removed, and replaced by one composed of French soldiers, at whose hands the Pontiff, now in his eighty-first year, suffered unworthy insults. He was ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... penned for the benefit of the youthful Frederick. The preface makes mention of "my little Frizchen" thus:—"It were better had he been an angel, but he is just a human child:" then, facetiously, it is added, "he is less ideal than saucy and conceited." Those who like myself knew only the solemnity of the painter in advanced years have a difficulty in supposing in the child such traits compatible. These songs of the domestic affections were set to music; the father, as a dilettante complete, cultivated all the harmonies whether of thought, ...
— Overbeck • J. Beavington Atkinson
... Mrs Twitter had dismissed the few friends that night, they sat down at their own fireside, with no one near them but the little foundling, which lay in the youngest Twitter's disused cradle, gazing at them with its usual solemnity, for it did not seem to require sleep. They opened up their minds to each ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... spasmodic and half-hearted effort. You must begin by making up your mind adequately. You must rise to the height of the affair. You must approach a grand undertaking in the grand manner. You ought to mark the day in the calendar as a solemnity. Human nature is weak, and has need of tricky aids, even in the pursuit of happiness. Time will be necessary to you, and time regularly and sacredly set apart. Many people affirm that they cannot be regular, ...
— Literary Taste: How to Form It • Arnold Bennett
... troth! the mair I think of it, the less I see what way we would be required. The place—ay, feggs! they had forgot the place. Eh, Shaws, ye're a lang-heided chield when ye like! Forbye that I'm awing ye my life," he added, with more solemnity, and offered me his hand upon ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Modernist Committee. For some months it had been a settled thing that Meynell should preach the sermon in Dunchester Cathedral on the great occasion in January when the new Liturgy of the Reform was to be inaugurated with all possible solemnity in one of England's most ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... as happy, Sand went to his new place of abode, where he arrived some time before the festival of the Wartburg. This festival, established to celebrate the anniversary of the battle of Leipzig, was regarded as a solemnity throughout Germany, and although the princes well knew that it was a centre for the annual renewal of affiliation to the various societies, they dared not forbid it. Indeed, the manifesto of the Teutonic Association was exhibited at this festival and signed by more than two ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - KARL-LUDWIG SAND—1819 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... communicated. The unfortunate ship was now in a blaze; at half-past eleven she blew up, and the tremendous concussion was felt at the very kelsons of all the ships near her. The combatants on both sides seemed equally to feel the solemnity of this destructive scene. A pause of at least ten minutes ensued, each engaged in contemplating a sight so grand and terrible. The Orion was not far off; but, being happily placed to windward, the few fiery fragments that fell in her were soon extinguished. ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez, Vol. I • Sir John Ross
... moments, a few moments, when one seems to feel what it is, moments when one stands face to face with the universal Life and realises wordlessly what it means." Geisner spoke with grave solemnity. The others, hardly breathing, understood how this man had thought ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller |
