"Faint-hearted" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... contrive. In quickly conceived strategy he began to give pause in his attack, nay, he retreated a step or two. No scruples hampered his devices, no code of honor limited the means he would employ. Backing before his opponent, he seemed to Rudolf to be faint-hearted; he was baffled, but seemed despairing; he was weary, but played a more complete fatigue. Rudolf advanced, pressing and attacking, only to meet a defence as perfect as his own. They were in the middle of the room now, close by the table. Rupert, as though he had ...
— Rupert of Hentzau - From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim: The Sequel to - The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... serious apprehension. Some of them, we know, care nothing for power—they would surrender, not sacrifice it, at any time cheerfully—most of all at a crisis when its retention might subject them to the reproach of a broken pledge. Neither do we believe that this is a faint-hearted Cabinet, or that its members are capable of yielding their opinions to the brutum fulmen of the League. That body is by no means popular. The great bulk of the manufacturing artisans are totally indifferent to its proceedings; for they know well that self-interest, and ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... after fifty years, why it was that there should have been this virulent feeling against them, so foreign to the easy-going and tolerant British nature, I would confess that I think the real reason was fear. Not fear of them individually, of course- -our foulest detractors have never called us faint-hearted—but fear of their star, fear of their future, fear of the subtle brain whose plans always seemed to go aright, and of the heavy hand which had struck nation after nation to the ground. We were but a small country, with a population which, ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... but faint-hearted crusaders, even the walkers, nowadays, who undertake no persevering, never-ending enterprises. Our expeditions are but tours, and come round again at evening to the old hearth-side from which we set out. Half the walk is but retracing our steps. We should go forth on the shortest ...
— Walking • Henry David Thoreau
... an official minute the "one great question to which we should look in all our arrangements: What is to be their final result on the character of the people?" The following passage in that remarkable document may be commended to our faint-hearted doubters of to-day: ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... smoothing the brows of handsome young soldiers, but thrilled by the desperate need of service, hard and ugly and terrible, among those poor bloody men, agonizing through the night, helpless in their pain, moaning before the rescue of death. The faint-hearted among these women fled panic-stricken, with blanched faces, to Nice and Monte Carlo and provincial chateaux, where they played with less unpleasant work. But there were not many like that. Most of them ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... Mexican people. Such policy, if only followed in time, would have so strengthened the hands of Maximilian that, in all probability, he would have been able to hold his ground when most unchivalrously abandoned by his faint-hearted ally. No doubt the anti-president claimed that he was a reformer of the church. And surely, indeed, he was, if it was reform to suppress all religious societies whatsoever, to rob the clergy of their property, and that so completely ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell
... taught us by Our Lord, is of high dignity and importance. It is not alone a prayer, but a sermon as well. It is a prayer which comprises in itself all other prayers. It is a prayer of praise, of thanksgiving and supplication. It is, therefore, appropriate for all occasions. Are you discouraged and faint-hearted, go and say the "Our Father." The thought that you have an all-merciful Father in heaven will lift you up, inspire you with confidence and comfort you. Do self-love and pride strive for the mastery within you, go and say, "Hallowed be Thy name." Is anger and malice in your heart, ...
— The Excellence of the Rosary - Conferences for Devotions in Honor of the Blessed Virgin • M. J. Frings
... attempts at humanity seem to have been rather faint-hearted, as the following passage from Mr. Maguire's "Irish in America," showing how they were carried out, and how inadequate was the remedy applied in ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... Mrs. Wriothesley, was, I give you my word, the first faint-hearted conception of myself and three companions," said Beauchamp, laughing, as he welcomed that lady and Miss Chipchase; "but you see people have been kind to us, and that we are more popular in society than ...
— Belles and Ringers • Hawley Smart
... gon above 20 yards before Lindsey on a sudden stood still and cry'd out, by all that's good he was seized with such unaccountable terrours & astonishment that it was impossible for him to stir one step further. Upon which Cromwell call'd him faint-hearted fool, & bid him stand there & observe or be witness: and then advancing to some distance from him, he met with a grave elderly man, with a roll of parchment in his hand, who deliver'd it to Cromwell, who eagerly perused it. Lindsey, a little recover'd from ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 76, April 12, 1851 • Various
... same confident spirit that the little party embarked shortly afterwards. Not one of them felt faint-hearted as the unknown future loomed up before them. Nevertheless, could they have known just then of the astonishing experiences through which they were shortly fated to pass, possibly their pulses must have ...
— Boy Scouts on Hudson Bay - The Disappearing Fleet • G. Harvey Ralphson
... girl, weak and weary! A voice seemed crying from that grave so dreary, "What wouldst thou do, my daughter?"—and she started, And quick recoiled, aghast, faint-hearted; But Paul, impatient, urges evermore Her steps towards the open door; And when, beneath her feet, the unhappy maid Crushes the laurel near the house immortal, And with her head, as Paul talks on again, Touches the crown of filigrane Suspended ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... under incredible hardships, so he sharpened those of his mind amid the greatest difficulties. His first care was to make sure of France. To a deputation of the servile senate he roundly denounced all faint-hearted civil officials as menacing the authority of law. "Timid and cowardly soldiers," he said, "may cost a nation its independence; faint-hearted officials, however, destroy the authority of the laws. ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... when Columbus landed on Hayti, he found there about 1,000,000 Indians, of a gentle refinement of manners, living peaceably under their kings or caciques. They were "faint-hearted creatures," "a barbarous sort of people, totally given to sensuality and a brutish custom of life, hating all manner of labour, and only inclined to run from place to place." The Spaniards killed many thousands of them, hunted a number with their bloodhounds, sent ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... "Yes it would, you faint-hearted nigger!" cried the middy, losing all patience, "for if I could do that I'd be able to wring the neck of every pirate in ...
— The Middy and the Moors - An Algerine Story • R.M. Ballantyne
... 'You were always a faint-hearted thing,' exclaimed the insect, quite forgetting even to be commonly polite, so elated was he with pride. 'Just compare the difference in our lives! I fly here, I fly there, now on this flower, now on that. Ah, mine is a glorious life! nothing but pleasure and excitement all the ...
— Parables from Flowers • Gertrude P. Dyer
... which the dogs must draw, and the badness and unevenness of the way. For the ground was undulating, like a sea agitated by a storm. But pleased as we were with our sledges and dogs, we were as dissatisfied with Rotschitlen, a faint-hearted youth, without activity or experience. With another driver we might have been able in a few days to penetrate as far as the bottom of Kolyutschin Bay, which differs greatly in its form, from that which Russian, English, and German maps give to it. It is not improbable that it is almost ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... say that David had not his sad days, when he gave himself up for lost, and when God seemed to have forsaken him, and forgotten his promise. He was a man of like passions with ourselves; and therefore he was, as we should have been, terrified and faint-hearted at times. But exactly what God was teaching and training him to be, was not to be fainthearted— not to be terrified. He began in his youth by trusting God. That made him the man after God's own heart, ...
— Sermons on National Subjects • Charles Kingsley
... indeed," replied Shaggy. "This Nome King is really a powerful fellow and has a legion of nomes to assist him, whereas our bold Queen commands a Clockwork Man and a band of faint-hearted officers." ...
— Tik-Tok of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... delight, in great haste to dismiss whoever had knocked, so that she might hear the rest of Marilla's story. She opened the door wide to whoever might have come on some country errand, and looked the tired and faint-hearted Mr. Laneway full in ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... other in Saul's tent, shows that the one has lost, and the other received, the Spirit which strengthens. David has become the encourager, and his cheery words bring some hopefulness to the gloomy, faint-hearted king. The Septuagint has a variant reading in verse 32, which brings this out and suits the context, 'Let not my lord's heart fail.' But, whether this be adopted or no, David appears as quite unaffected by the terror which had unmanned ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... dinners; prove, by mathematical demonstration, that a mold of delicious blanc-mange or Spanish cream or simpler junket costs less and can be made in one-tenth of the time required for the leathery-skinned, sour or faint-hearted pie, without which "father'n the boys wouldn't relish their dinner;" that an egg and lettuce salad, with mayonnaise dressing, is so much more toothsome and digestible than chipped beef as a "tea relish," ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... Bay; it led Nelson and Grant to victory; it has been the great tonic in the world of invention, discovery, and art; it has won a thousand triumphs in war and science which were deemed impossible by doubters and the faint-hearted. ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... a large force would soon arrive from England, subject to his directions. At this very moment a ship of war, the Asia, lay anchored opposite the city; its grim batteries bearing upon it, greatly to the disquiet of the faint-hearted among ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... The faint-hearted who failed are judged by us as though they failed before the nation yesterday; the brave are re-enshrined as we read; the traitor, to us, is no grotesque Guy Fawkes, but ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... before noon the public vote was taken; one or two faint-hearted members sought a craven's refuge and slunk quietly from the chamber. As each name was called, the deputy rose in his place and gave his vote, there was no ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... ill-arranged collection of steep and narrow streets, one of which—Cheap Street—deserves notice for its quaintness. The spaciousness of the market-place redeems the narrowness of the streets. With the exception of a little faint-hearted sympathy shown to Monmouth, Frome has never helped to make history. Nowadays it does a brisk trade in woollen cloth, and possesses some large printing-works, breweries, and art-metal works. The visitor would do well to make ...
— Somerset • G.W. Wade and J.H. Wade
... Faint-hearted men and women shook their heads, and said: "Be prudent. You know Great Britain has scores of ships of war, and we have not one; how can we hope to ...
— Harper's Young People, July 13, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... quickly, From the shades that lurk, Like a black pall gathers thickly, Night, when none may work. Soon our restless occupation Shall have ceas'd to be; Units! in God's vast creation, Ciphers! what are we? Onward! onward! oh! faint-hearted; Nearer and more near Has the goal drawn since we started, Be ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... incumbered march, without breakfast, after a long, inactive sea-voyage, had wearied us sadly; and we threw our luggage upon, the ground, lay down upon it, and ruminated on a scene of little comfort to the faint-hearted, if there were any such in our little crowd of world-battered and battering strong ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... promising fortune but my design in seeking only such as would voluntarily go along with me was that I might be certain of your affection and resolution, and since you are they whom I ought only to rely upon in my present circumstances and danger, I shall now tell you that I was never so faint-hearted as to quit my inheritance without attempting what is possible for any man in my capacity. In order to this I feigned this design for Ireland for three reasons; first, to put my uncle in security, whom ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... Universal." Indeed I am a little surprised at your having forebodings, after my assurance to you before I left. I have none. My opinion is that, to be happy, it is best to think that, as we are the product of events, events will continue to produce that which is in harmony with us.... You are too faint-hearted, and that's the truth of it. I advise you not to abandon yourself to idolatry too readily; you know what I mean. It fills me with remorse when I think how very far below such a position my actual worth ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... the path for the faint-hearted, for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the ...
— Inaugural Presidential Address - Contributed Transcripts • Barack Hussein Obama
... little difficulty," said Primrose; "we really want to be independent, and as we know that there will be difficulties and discouragements in the career we are marking out for ourselves, and that we may often grow faint-hearted and lonely, Jasmine and I feel that we had better put ourselves quite out of the way of temptation. We have, therefore, made up our minds not to give our address to any one in Rosebury for at least two years. ...
— The Palace Beautiful - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... culture. The German element in Austria, our ally, is gravely menaced by the Slavs; Germany herself is exposed to a perpetual peaceful invasion of Slavonic workmen. Many Poles are firmly established in the heart of Westphalia. Only faint-hearted measures are taken to-day to stem this Slavonic flood. And yet to check this onrush of Slavism is not merely an obligation inherited from our fathers, but a duty in the interests of self-preservation and European civilization. It cannot ...
— Germany and the Next War • Friedrich von Bernhardi
... says: "Whether Lord Dunmore and Colonel Byrd have interfered with the Indians or not, Richard Henderson is equally ignorant and indifferent. The utmost result of their efforts can only serve to convince them of the futility of their schemes and possibly frighten some few faint-hearted persons, naturally prone to reverence great names and fancy everything must shrink at the magic of ...
— The Conquest of the Old Southwest • Archibald Henderson
... the Old World, backed, at last, by their respective governments, in his effort to prove that his invention was the simplest and the best of them all. That he should have persisted in spite of discouragement after discouragement, struggling to overcome obstacles which to the faint-hearted would have seemed insuperable, constitutes one of his greatest claims to undying fame. He left on record an account of his experiences in Europe on this voyage, memorable in more ways than one, and extracts from this, and from letters ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse
... the letter telling her when to come. She was shaken by it; she broke the seal and read it in this room. I suspected then that she'd begun to get faint-hearted, waiting; though she'd never let me ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather
... a more intricate subject had to be re-drawn. I have known promising beginners to give up pen and ink drawing in despair because they found themselves unequal to subjects which would have presented not a few difficulties to the experienced illustrator. When the beginner grows faint-hearted, let him seek consolation and encouragement in the thought that were pen drawing something to be mastered in a week or a month there would be small merit ...
— Pen Drawing - An Illustrated Treatise • Charles Maginnis
... sympathy of youthful and generous spirits. The assault on the revenues of the Church; the subsequent crusade against the House of Lords; the display of intellect and courage exhibited by Lord Lyndhurst in that assembly, when all seemed cowed and faint-hearted; all these were incidents or personal traits apt to stir the passions, and create in breasts not yet schooled to repress emotion, a sentiment even of enthusiasm. It is the personal that interests ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... then! to arms! Let the battle-cry rise, Like the raven's hoarse croak, through their ranks let it sound; Set their knell on the wing of each arrow that flies, Till the shouts of the free shake the mountains around; Let the cold-blooded, faint-hearted changeling now tremble, For the war-shock shall reach to his dark-centered cave, While the laurels that twine round the brows of the victors Shall with rev'rence be strew'd o'er ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume IV. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... Sunday, November 26, came the news of Wolfred Nelson's victory at St Denis. On Monday and Tuesday bands of Patriotes went about the countryside, terrorizing and disarming the loyalists and compelling the faint-hearted to join in the rising. On Wednesday night the rebels gathered to the number of about four hundred {94} in St Eustache, and got noisily drunk (s'y enivrerent bruyamment). They then proceeded, under the command of Girod and Chenier, to the Indian mission settlement at the Lake of Two Mountains. ...
— The 'Patriotes' of '37 - A Chronicle of the Lower Canada Rebellion • Alfred D. Decelles
... successor; that by an opposite conduct she showed herself the step-mother, not the natural parent of her people, and would seem desirous that England should no longer subsist than she should enjoy the glory and satisfaction of governing it; that none but timorous princes, or tyrants, or faint-hearted women, ever stood in fear of their successors; and that the affections of the people were a firm and impregnable rampart to every sovereign, who, laying aside all artifice or by-ends, had courage and magnanimity to put his sole trust in ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... wiser grown 95 By years of solitude,—that holds apart The past and future, giving the soul room To search into itself,—and long commune With this eternal silence;—more a god, In my long-suffering and strength to meet 100 With equal front the direst shafts of fate, Than thou in thy faint-hearted despotism, Girt with thy baby-toys of force and wrath. Yes, I am that Prometheus who brought down The light to man, which thou, in selfish fear, 105 Hadst to thyself usurped,—his by sole right, For Man hath right ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... at the commencement of October. On the 8th of that month Balbi wrote to Casanova that a whole night devoted to labour had resulted merely in the displacing of a single brick, which so discouraged the faint-hearted monk that he was for abandoning an attempt whose only result must be to increase in the future the rigour ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... them an address full of the most passionate and patriotic eloquence, and this appeal changed their purpose. Jackson's voice was afterwards heard in the halls of Congress; but we may be sure that he was never more in earnest or more truly eloquent than when he pleaded with the faint-hearted Americans to stand to their cause and their arms. Jackson's address revived their courage; and when, on the 15th of May, Elijah Clarke rode into camp, restored to health and accompanied by one hundred fresh recruits, the confidence of the ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris
... most successful careeristinas are the absolutely unconscious ones because they are not passively besieged nor actively bombarded by any doubts as to what they want. They play their game exceedingly well as do not the quasi-rebels and faint-hearted revoltees that form no small percentage of the Newest Women. For a number of women the feminist movement has been an attempt to break away from the traditions of the wife-careerist, and to strike a line of auto-careerism. Can the careeristina instinct, ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... wonderful bravery; nothing daunted him; beset by death on every hand he remained cool and resolute, rallying us after every onset, rousing the faint-hearted ...
— For The Admiral • W.J. Marx
... take the place, there would be a vacancy in the law offices. Fitzjames hesitated; but, after consulting Lord Selborne, and hearing Coleridge's private opinion that he would be appointed Solicitor-General even if he failed to win the seat, he felt that it would be 'faint-hearted' to refuse. He was to sit as judge, however, at Dorchester, and thought that it would be improper to abandon this duty. The consequent delay, as it turned out, had serious effects. From Dorchester he ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... toppling oranges, with a crazy wooden verandah impending over the water; indeed the whole house, inclusive of the complaining flag-staff on the roof, impended over the water, but seemed to have got into the condition of a faint-hearted diver who has paused so long on the brink that he will never go in ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... pleasant predicament for a nervous or a faint-hearted man to be placed in. But then Mr. Chase is neither nervous nor faint-hearted, and when Congress came together he not only told his wants frankly, but proposed a neat little plan for supplying them without selling notes at fifty ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... good sense. Taking the lead in the bitter journey, through swamps and snows, threading the tangled forests, climbing cliffs, and fording half-frozen creeks,—day after day the heroic woman pushed her faint-hearted husband on, feeding him from her own little store of ember-baked cakes, and eating almost nothing herself till they were more than half way to Sertigan on ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... man who had said, "Yes;" and he, accepting the responsibility with a faint-hearted smile, said, "Yes," again, and breathed hard. "Saw his wife and child—purty gal?" said Abner cautiously. "Yes," answered the man doggedly. "Saw her photograph, ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... older and face the world you will find it looks like a great, fierce giant. But really its fierce look is caused by a false-face that it wears to frighten faint-hearted people. You go boldly up and take hold of his beard, as David faced the giant, and you will be surprised to find that not only the beard but the whole mask comes off in your hands, and there is a kindly countenance behind. For the world would rather ...
— Fifty-Two Story Talks To Boys And Girls • Howard J. Chidley
... much progress she had made that even this shock did not set her to express any more faint-hearted doubts, and, when Lord Northmoor arrived the next day, the involuntary radiance on both their faces was token enough that they were all the world to each other. Mary allowed herself to venture on getting Lady Kenton's counsel ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a small dungeon and held up his candle. This was the last resting-place of a good man, a warm-hearted, unselfish man; a man whose whole life was given to succoring the poor, encouraging the faint-hearted, visiting the sick; in relieving distress, whenever and wherever he found it. His heart, his hand, and his purse were always open. With his story in one's mind he can almost see his benignant countenance ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... you again. Well, to be sure! And you'd stand by and see the money given away in that way to enable the man you hate to take away the girl you love! Well, I never—. They did say you was faint-hearted, but I never thought to see the like of that in a thing that called itself a man." And so ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... "Don't you be faint-hearted," said George. "We are not caught yet. I wonder whether Susan would say it was a sin to try ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... friendly word to me at times; I am so homesick and faint-hearted, my Hoffman. Thanks; they are almost worthy the lips that ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott
... Stephen was alive among them, but Mother Marshall never said anything about it; she just kept it there, and it comforted her to feel it; one of those little homely, tangible things that our poor souls have to tether to sometimes when we lose the vision and get faint-hearted. Mother Marshall wasn't morbid one bit. She always looked on the bright side of everything; and she had had much joy in her son as he was growing up. She had seen him strong of body, strong of soul, keen of mind. He had won the scholarship of the whole Northwest to ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... is brave sailing, I thought, though I would not have gone if I could have helped it. We struggled on in this way for a day and a night, and then he said we were beyond the region of storms from land. I am afraid I should, if left to myself, linger always with the faint-hearted mariners who hug the shore, notwithstanding this great experience of finding our safety by steering boldly off from every thing wherein we had before considered our only security lay. After this, I performed ...
— Life at Puget Sound: With Sketches of Travel in Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon and California • Caroline C. Leighton
... expressly for her. It told her that, despite anything anyone might presume to urge to the contrary, God was ever the loving Father of His children; that He rejoiced when they rejoiced, suffered when they sorrowed; however much the faint-hearted might be led to believe that the world was ruled by remorseless law, that much faith and a little patience would enable even the veriest sinner to see how the seemingly cruellest inflictions of Providence were for the sufferer's ultimate good, ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte
... without her making any resistance. And she in turn kissed him, but with a sad, light, faint-hearted kiss that in no way recalled the hysterical caress of the Aquarium. Her voice, which appeared to be coming from afar off, was repeating what she had counseled him ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... faint-hearted Irene submitted to pay you tribute. She ought to have made you pay tribute to her. Return to me all that she paid you; else the matter must be settled by ...
— Famous Men of The Middle Ages • John H. Haaren, LL.D. and A. B. Poland, Ph.D.
... us dwell on what we cannot help,' said Violet; 'let us do our best, and then leave it in the best Hands, and He will bring out good. You cannot think how much happier I have been since I knew it was wrong to be faint-hearted.' ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... person is yourself; and no man can finish a task before he begins it. We'll grant there's a chance for failure—a million chances; but don't try to count them. Count the chances for success. Don't be faint-hearted, for there's no such thing as fear. It doesn't exist. It's merely an absence of courage, just as indecision is merely a lack of decision. I never saw anything yet of which I was afraid—and you're a man. The deity of success is a woman, and she insists on ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... in a blaze of colour under the June sunlight. The scent of fruits and flowers was heavy on the air. A faint-hearted breeze which scarcely dared to blow came up from the harbour now and again, and made the heat just bearable. Mr. William Holmes Barndale, of Barndale in the county of Surrey, and King's Bench Walk-, Temple, ...
— An Old Meerschaum - From Coals Of Fire And Other Stories, Volume II. (of III.) • David Christie Murray
... they assailed the city. [19] It is said that they saw over the gate opposite the Parian (which they were about to attack) a crucified Christ dripping blood, and at His feet the seraphic father, St. Francis, with face uplifted toward Him. On this account they became so faint-hearted that they were forced to retire, without being observed from the city, as it was night. Those in Quiapo set fire to it and burned it. They killed some natives, whose moans and cries were heard on the city walls. At this juncture day dawned, and it was seen that the enemy were marching ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XIV., 1606-1609 • Various
... natures as these will remain for a long while in the position that I have described. This was my own case. I became the plaything of two contending impulses; the desires of youth were always held in check by a faint-hearted sentimentality. Life in Paris is a cruel ordeal for impressionable natures, the great inequalities of fortune or of position inflame their souls and stir up bitter feelings. In that world of magnificence and pettiness envy is more apt to be a dagger ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... the attempt to hold the election resulted in such mobs and tumult that it was forbidden to be held by a faint-hearted Free State mayor, and was consequently adjourned to Easton. The Free State printing press of Mark Delahay was, during these troubles, destroyed. At Easton, a mob undertook to break up the election, but was driven off, and in the affray one of the ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler
... There was a rumor that seven of them were still living twenty years after White's departure. But no certain news was ever had of them, though several later attempts to trace them were made. Between the time when their faint-hearted governor had deserted them, and his return, three years had passed; and if they were not early destroyed by the hostile tribes, they must have endured a more lingering pain in hoping against hope for the white sails that never rose above the horizon. Most of them, if not all, were doubtless ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... to other villages and other datos, who endure and protect them and do not order them about. This is the kind of dato that they now prefer, not him who has the spirit to command. There is a great need of reform in this, for the chiefs are spiritless and faint-hearted. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, V7, 1588-1591 • Emma Helen Blair
... freedom—not to go home that evening to be delivered into the hands of his new master. In putting into execution his bold resolve, he secreted himself, and so remained for three weeks. In the meantime his mother, who was a slave, resolved to escape also, but after one week's gloomy foreboding, she became "faint-hearted and gave the struggle over." But Joseph did not know what surrender meant. His sole thought was to procure a ticket on the U.G.R.R. for Canada, which by persistent effort he succeeded in doing. He hid himself in a steamer, and by this way reached Philadelphia, ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... great happiness, she was possessed by a gloomy sadness that came of dark forebodings in her mind. The very greatness and sureness of this happiness awed her into doubt. She knew that to take her good fortune in this faint-hearted way was not wise in itself, and was not what Pepe would approve; and that she might please Pepe she berated herself roundly and tried to laugh away her fears—though they scarcely amounted to fears, being ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... began to fall sick and faint-hearted—whereupon, very orderly, and with good discretion, they entreated me to regard the safety of mine own life, as well as the preservation of theirs; and that I should not, through over-boldness, leave their widows and fatherless children to ...
— The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book • Various
... civilization, and the net results upon the individual of the experiences of his ancestors, which we designate by the term "heredity"? For many years we were in serious doubt how far we could depend upon the loyalty of this group of auxiliaries, and many of the faint-hearted among us were inclined to regard their sympathies as really against us rather than with us, and prepared to see them desert to the enemy at any time. It was pointed out, as of great apparent weight, that consumption was decidedly and emphatically a disease of civilization; that it ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... leaves make songs above one's head. Here and there she goes through brambly ways, where amorous arms from blackberry bushes strive to catch and hold her, and where star-eyed daisies and buttercups and delicate faint-hearted primroses peep out ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... spirits. He wished he had not cried quite so much. He remembered how once Sweyn had come home with his arm torn down from the shoulder, and a dead bear; and how he had never winced nor said a word, though his lips turned white with pain. Poor little Rol gave another sighing sob over his own faint-hearted shortcomings. ...
— The Were-Wolf • Clemence Housman
... answered, with a faint-hearted assumption of confidence. "Of course, you know the property is so good that you'll make a profit on the shares you've bought far below their value. But I don't think I ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... faint-hearted and desponding about the bull, Luther wrote, saying that, when burning it, he trembled at first and prayed; but now he felt more rejoiced than at any other act in all his life. He now released himself ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... not rest content with a humble lot; no honour must seem to high for her to strive for; she must go with me gladly a-viking; war-weed must she wear; she must egg me on to strife, and never wink her eyes where sword-blades lighten; for if she be faint-hearted, scant honour will befall me." Is it not true, so ...
— The Vikings of Helgeland - The Prose Dramas Of Henrik Ibsen, Vol. III. • Henrik Ibsen
... it was a necessity. I had begun to realize that William was not likely to bring his courage to the sticking point without a great deal of encouragement. Distasteful as the idea was to me, I did not intend to shrink from what I felt was to be my duty. If he, though languishing for love, was too faint-hearted to propose, I saw that it would be necessary for ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... is so faint-hearted as not to serve with the resolution of conquering or dying, this is the time for such ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... thou sullen and yet faint-hearted slave," answered Varney, with bitterness, "that no MURDER as thou callest it, with that staring look and stammering tone, is designed in the matter? Wert thou not told that a brief illness, such as woman puts on in very wantonness, that ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... is of that proud house of Plantagenet who never own that a hurt grieves them. While they have themselves been bleeding to death, under a mortal wound, they have been known to bind up the scratches sustained by their more faint-hearted comrades. Florise, we have done frightfully wrong, and, for my own part, I would buy with every jewel I have that our ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... Quaritch on that night of the farewell scene with Ida in the churchyard, and so he continued to think for some time to come. A man's life is always more or less a struggle; he is a swimmer upon an adverse sea, and to live at all he must keep his limbs in motion. If he grows faint-hearted or weary and no longer strives, for a little while he floats, and then at last, morally or physically, he vanishes. We struggle for our livelihoods, and for all that makes life worth living in the material sense, and not the less are we called upon to struggle with an army of spiritual ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... of the greatness of Sparta, was admiral of the Greek fleet, but yet was faint-hearted in time of danger, and willing to weigh anchor and set sail for the isthmus of Corinth, near which the land army lay encamped; which Themistocles resisted; and this was the occasion of the well-known words, when Eurybiades, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... in our ears; the issue, the sharpest and simplest, the most tremendous that can be put to a generation of men—"Forward or backward?"—is the issue which confronts us at the present time, and on it the future of the Government is staked. There are faint-hearted friends behind; there are loud-voiced foes in front. The brewer's dray has been pulled across the road, and behind it are embattled a formidable confederation of vested interests. A mountainous obstacle of indifference and apathy ...
— Liberalism and the Social Problem • Winston Spencer Churchill
... that weapon wieldest Spare thy speering why we fled, Oft for less falls hail of battle, Forth we fled to wreak revenge; Who was he, faint-hearted foeman, Who, when tongues of steel sung high, Stole beneath the booth for shelter, While his ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... one it was, had passed away; Fleda had just finished packing her trunk, and was sitting with a faint-hearted feeling of body and mind, trying to rest before being called to her early dinner, when Florence came to tell ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... returned Denison, "'Sail on!' as Joaquin Miller has Columbus say to the faint-hearted sailing master. 'The North Pole or bust!' is ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman
... had a very depressing effect upon the followers of Dost Mahomed, who, although still at the head of an army of 14,000 men, found that there was no courage in his faint-hearted followers, and that they could not be trusted even to be true to himself. His position being thus hopeless, Dost Mahomed fled from Cabul on the 2nd of August, and that city was entered in state by Shah Soojah, who then, though for a short time, was ...
— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... the sake of the drama, but an attempt to combine the songs with the continuous working out of a dramatic impulse in the modern manner. But the attempt is far less successful than in "Romeo"; and indeed it is a faint-hearted one. Whenever a song occurs, the action is suspended, and all the actors save the lucky vocalist of the minute are at their wits' end to know where to look, and what to do with their hands, feet—their whole persons in fact—and the parts they are playing. And the songs are far from ...
— Old Scores and New Readings • John F. Runciman
... say unto him: Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither be faint-hearted for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin with Syria, and ...
— The Book Of Mormon - An Account Written By The Hand Of Mormon Upon Plates Taken - From The Plates Of Nephi • Anonymous
... freshly baked bread, or a basket of graham gems; or Geoff with a creel of trout and an urgent invitation to lunch or dinner or both. New books made their appearance from below, newspapers and magazines; and if ever the day came when Imogen felt hopelessly faint-hearted, lonely, and over-worked, she was sure to see the flutter of skirts, and her pretty, cordial neighbors would come riding up the trail to cheer her, and to propose something pleasant or helpful. Sometimes Elsie would have her baby on her knee, trusting to "Summer Savory's" sure-footed steadiness; ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... Ukridge on the only occasion when I ventured to bring up the unpleasant topic, "of course we shall pay. Why not? I don't like to see this faint-hearted spirit in you, old horse. The money isn't coming in yet, I admit, but we must give it time. Soon we shall be turning over hundreds a week, hundreds! I'm in touch with all the big places,—Whiteley's, Harrod's, all ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse
... rent them in pieces and scattered them in fragments in the air. Doleful was the ruin and great the terror where this baleful cloud passed by, and it left a long track of desolation over sea and land. Some of the faint-hearted," adds Antonio Agapida, "looked upon this torment of the elements as a prodigious event, out of the course of nature. In the weakness of their fears they connected it with those troubles which occurred in various places, considering it a portent of some great calamity ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... her place in my heart beside Daniel. Both abide with me bringing atonement and purification, mediators with the cry of "Sursum corda!"—When the day comes for Death to approach, he shall not find me unprepared or faint-hearted. Our faith hopes for and awaits the deliverance to which it leads us. Yet as long as we are upon earth we must attend to our daily task. And mine shall not lie unproductive. However trifling it may seem to others, to me it is indispensable. ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... however numerous they may be, can only give rise to a pessimistic or fault-finding temper in a faint-hearted and timid man. All these failings have a casual, transitory character, and are completely dependent on conditions of life; in some ten years they will have disappeared or given place to other fresh defects, which are all inevitable and will in their turn alarm the faint-hearted. The ...
— The Wife and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... thought I, my stomach rising in contempt for this noble-looking but extremely faint-hearted privateersman. "Come," I said, rallying him, "we fall in with a Frenchman, or—let us suppose—an American: that is ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... frantic gestures, the arms swinging wildly—and then the body shoots off into frightful space, plunging upon the pavement with a revolting thud. The man's arm strikes a bystander as he darts down. The crowd shudders, sways, and utters a low murmur of pity and horror. The faint-hearted lookers-on hide their ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... outlook in the trade; it had never been so bad, they said, while Mr. Polly wondered if "De-juiced" was a permissible epithet. There were men with an overweening sense of their importance, manifestly annoyed and angry to find themselves still disengaged, and inclined to suspect a plot, and men so faint-hearted one was terrified to imagine their behaviour when it came to an interview. There was a fresh-faced young man with an unintelligent face who seemed to think himself equipped against the world beyond all ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... retrogression. Suffice to say, I was terribly cut up over the way my first serious affair of the heart turned out, and tried my best to hate myself for letting it worry me. Somehow I was able to attribute the fiasco to an inborn sense of shyness that has always made me faint-hearted, dilatory and unaggressive. No doubt if I had gone about it roughshod and fiery I could have played hob with the excellent jeweller's peace of mind, to say the least, but alas! I succeeded only in approaching at a time when there was nothing left for me to do but to start him off in life ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... them into the low-ceilinged parlour, with the horsehair-covered sofa and the Family Bible on the little table in the window, that had been a haven to so many faint-hearted ones during the ...
— The Long Trick • Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... there politicians grow faint-hearted, the army fights on with cheerfulness. It would be a cure for pessimism of the deepest black to go to the trenches for a while. There all is cheery optimism, no doubt at all about the final outcome, and no talk of peace. I have never heard ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... and dinners to scores of beggars who blessed us. Every man who held my horse or cleaned my boots got a ducat for his pains. I was, I may say, the author of our common good fortune, by putting boldness into our play. Pippi was a faint-hearted fellow, who was always cowardly when he began to win. My uncle (I speak with great respect of him) was too much of a devotee, and too much of a martinet at play ever to win GREATLY. His moral courage was unquestionable, ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... party, that it was time to wash off the dust of the battle-field from their faces, and mount fresh linen and cambric. Those who were pleased to call themselves "good fellows" declared for "another bottle;" the faint-hearted swore that an autograph invitation from Venus herself to the heathen Olympus, with nectar and ambrosia for tea and bread-and-butter, could not tempt them from the Christian enjoyment of a feather-bed after the fag of such a day; but the preux chevaliers—those ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... insidious and shameless, Ungrateful, faint-hearted and wicked; At heart we are cold, sterile ...
— The Shield • Various
... rigging, displaying more than ordinary agility in the act. At short intervals, other men, roused from watch below appeared at the fo'c'sle companion-way. To these the situation at first appeared comic, and called forth jeers upon their faint-hearted shipmates. The next moment, on the dog dashing into view, they found a common cause with their fellows and sprang aloft. Ere many minutes had elapsed the entire crew were in the rigging, much to the amusement of the officers. By this time the dog had disappeared beneath ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... marked considerably lower: Russian is quoted at from 31s. to 33s.; whilst Egyptian and Turkish are marked from 24s. to 26s. per quarter; and fine American flour is quoted at a price considerably under 'English Households.' These are not signs of decrepit or faint-hearted farming. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 420, New Series, Jan. 17, 1852 • Various
... Tanis, many had been faint-hearted and rebellious, and others had endeavored to separate their lot from the rest and remain behind; but here, too, they were carried away by the majority. Eleasar, the son of Aaron, and the distinguished heads of the tribe of Judah, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... echoed Mark, cheerfully, 'if there warn't any water between you and me, and nothing faint-hearted-like in going back, I don't know that I mightn't say the same. But here am I, Dragon, in New York, America; and there are you in Wiltshire, Europe; and there's a fortune to make, Dragon, and a beautiful young lady to make it for; and whenever you go to see the Monument, Dragon, you mustn't ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... Greek belief that the spirits of the dead found no rest till their obsequies had been performed. Such preparations did not daunt the spirits of Leonidas and his men, and his wife, Gorgo, not a woman to be faint-hearted or hold him back. Long before, when she was a very little girl, a word of hers had saved her father from listening to a traitorous message from the King of Persia; and every Spartan lady was bred up to be able to say to those she best loved that they must come home from battle ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... judgment (or some stage of being which that expression may serve to symbolize) is reached. But the faithful fighters of this hour, or the beings that then and there will represent them, may then turn to the faint-hearted, who here decline to go on, with words like those with which Henry IV. greeted the tardy Crillon after a great victory had been gained: "Hang yourself, brave Crillon! we fought at Arques, and you were ...
— The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James
... After this, a faint-hearted attempt was made to continue our talk. But it was no good. We soon discovered that each one of us had been simulating a false interest in our never-ending discussion. We really wished to see with our own eyes these Legation Guards who ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... faint-hearted. It must have been the gorge below that made her breath come in catching sobs. But on and on she went until through the window she could see Bobbie with Happy Pete asleep in his arms. The child was still ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... saying; "what do I want with luxuries? Ask Deborah if I care what I eat and drink; we shall do very well, if you and Esther are not so faint-hearted." And when we found out how our protests seemed to hurt him, we let him have his own way; only Allan and I exchanged looks, which said as plainly as looks could, "Is he not the best uncle that ever lived, and will we not work our hardest to ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... he exclaimed, in faint-hearted irony. Then, remembering his advantage, he stepped ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... individual, but with a national hero. In his small official capacity as Mayor of Wellingsford, he was but the mouthpiece of a national sentiment. And more than that. This ceremony was an appeal to the unimaginative, the sluggish, the faint-hearted. In its little way—and please remember that all tremendous enthusiasms are fit by these little fires—it was a proclamation of the undying glory of England. It was impersonal, it was national, it was Imperial. In its little way it was of ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... graduated together from the gutters of Montmartre into the later control of Madame Louison's pretty little pied d' terre in Paris, hard by Auteuil, in that dreamy little impasse, the Rue de Berlioz. Neither of these attendants were faint-hearted, for their young hearts had been attuned early to the wolfish precocity of the Parisian waif. And they had followed their resolute mistress in her weary ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... is the same As the eaglet's to soar with his eyes on the sun; Whose nobility comes to thee, stamp'd with a seal Far, far more ennobling than monarch e'er set; With the blood of thy race offer'd up for the weal Of a nation that swears by that martyrdom yet! Shalt thou be faint-hearted, and turn from the strife, From the mighty arena, where all that is grand, And devoted, and pure, and adorning in life Is for high-thoughted spirits like thine to command? Oh no! never dream it; while good men despair Between tyrants and traitors, and timid men bow, Never think for an instant ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... in Jamestown, he found the colony in disorder and panic. All were on the point of sailing for home, completely disheartened, for they thought him dead, and feared the Indians. But again he put life into the enterprise, and set the faint-hearted to work, freed from the fear of Indian attack, since Pocahontas stood ...
— The Story of Pocahontas and Captain John Smith • E. Boyd Smith
... Warren is a General as well as a gentleman, and is only overshadowed by a greater genius,—not obliterated. Ayres, accounted the best soldier in the Fifth corps, but too quietly modest for his own favor, fought like a lion in this pitch of battle, making all the faint-hearted around him ashamed to do ill with such an example contiguous. General Bartlett, keen-faced and active like a fiery scimitar, was leading his division as if he were an immortal! He was closest at hand in the most gallant episodes, and held at nightfall a bundle of captured battle-flags. But Griffin, ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... impossible, absurd craft, that rolled from side to side in the most gentle sea. She would start out courageously to cross the bay along the strip of Moro coast in Northern Mindanao; but the throbbing of her engines growing weaker and weaker, she would presently turn back faint-hearted, unable to make headway, at the mercy of a sudden storm, and with the possibility of being swept up on a hostile shore among bloodthirsty and unreasonable Moros. Another time, and we were caught in a typhoon ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... the more adventurous ones, followed by the women and children, who, like angels, tread where men fear to go. The great mass of the crowd is composed of the workmen of the town. The faint-hearted and the cowardly bring up the rear. When the marble steps that lead up to the mansion are reached, the vanguard halts. The impetus of the entire line is arrested as if by magic. An unheard, invisible signal is obeyed, the signal of fear. Then the men in ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams |
