"Groundless" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fix his attention on these images, but they danced about, broke up and flickered. When these images vanished altogether from the broad dark background which every man sees when he closes his eyes, he began to hear hurried footsteps, the rustle of skirts, the sound of a kiss and—an intense groundless joy took possession of him . . . . Abandoning himself to this joy, he heard the orderly return and announce that there was no beer. Lobytko was terribly indignant, and began ...
— The Party and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... the common lamentation of Spanish historiographers, that, for an obscure and melancholy space of time immediately succeeding the conquest of their country by the Moslems, its history is a mere wilderness of dubious facts, groundless fables, and rash exaggerations. Learned men, in cells and cloisters, have worn out their lives in vainly endeavoring to connect incongruous events, and to account for startling improbabilities, recorded of this period. ...
— Wolfert's Roost and Miscellanies • Washington Irving
... the safety of his showcases were groundless. Even as he sprang up the steps to the side door of his place of business, he heard familiar voices in the store. He recognized the voices, and, halting momentarily to wipe his forehead with his handkerchief ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... necessary. A man of the name of Houseman, with whom he was acquainted, (a resident in Knaresborough,) declared that Clarke had borrowed rather a considerable sum from him, and did not scruple openly to accuse him of the evident design to avoid repayment. A few more dark but utterly groundless conjectures were afloat; and since the closest search—the minutest inquiry was employed without any result, the supposition that he might have been robbed and murdered was strongly entertained for some time; but as his body was never found, nor suspicion directed against any particular ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... after me. But there was no escape— no forest or shelter near where I could seek protection. On came the furious beasts, driven by no gentle hand. They came up with me, and I almost began to hope that my fears were groundless, when the horses suddenly stopped, a strong hand grasped me, a gag was thrust into my mouth, and again the well-known box was taken from the wagon. Another moment and I was securely caged, and on my way back to Montreal. Two men were in the wagon and two rode ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson
... regarded as the principal step to honour and advancement in public life. The greatest men practised it, and as they held action to be the criterion of oratory, made the best actors their models; nor was this a groundless opinion adopted by a few or superficial men; for Demosthenes having remarked with some asperity that the worst orators were heard in the rostrum in preference to him, the celebrated actor SATYRUS, in order to show him how much ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... of equal rights to the Jews may deprive the peasant of his land, is perfectly groundless. There are many other means whereby the tiller of the soil may be assured the possession of a portion of land. In the West we have systems such as that of the homestead, based on the inalienability of the family property (bien de famille). Such systems may be traced back as ...
— The Shield • Various
... arrived on the 17th of September. "For eight weeks," he wrote, "myself and all the officers lived upon salt beef; nor had the ship's company had a fresh meal since the 7th of April." The fears for his health that he had expressed before sailing from England had happily proved groundless, and a month's stay in port which now followed, at the most delightful and invigorating of the American seasons, wrought wonders for him. His letters to Locker state that the voyage agreed with him ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... incapacity of the competitors, but in reality because, the failure of the contest being the sole object that the Academy had in view, it behooved it to declare, without further delay, that the hopes of the friends of association were groundless. ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... pertinacious, and blind fancy of being in Jesus Christ and having interest in salvation. I call it a blind and ignorant fancy, for truly ignorance and darkness is the strongest foundation of such conceits. Papists call it the mother of devotion. It is true, in this sense it is the mother of a man's groundless devotion towards himself, that is, of delusion. This, together with self-love, which always hoodwinks the mind, and will not suffer a serious impartial examination of a man's self, these, I say, are the bottom of this vain persuasion, that possesseth ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... of encampment to form a judgment of the number of canoes that had preceded them; and they advanced, armed, and with great caution, through the woods. Their fears however on this occasion were fortunately groundless. ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... is inimitable both in itself, and as it contrasts with Othello's groundless jealousy, and with the foul conspiracy of which she is the innocent victim. Her beauty and external graces are only indirectly glanced at; we see 'her visage in her mind'; her character everywhere ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt
... make, or can make, the man, just precisely in the same way that the Schoolmaster or Schoolmistress is supposed to be omnipotent in the education of the boy or girl. And, unhappily, the Professor, unless he is a man of quite exceptional mental power for a Professor, shares this groundless opinion. The Schoolmaster is under-educated in regard to his work, and incapable of doing it neatly; the Professor is too often over-specialized and incapable of forming an intelligent, modest idea of his place in education; and the same consequence flows from the defect of either, an attempt to ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells
... been in that very morning. Why, he had then been in the mood to kill Dupre, or, at any rate, to welcome the news of his death with fierce joy! And then, simultaneously with his discovery of how groundless had been his jealousy, he had learnt the awful fact that the man whom he had wrongly accused lay out there, buried and yet alive, beneath the glistening sea, which was stretched out, like a great blue pall, ...
— Studies in love and in terror • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... very reason stick to their wool), that England may hereafter prohibit, limit, or discourage our linen trade, when it hath been once, with great pains and expense, thoroughly introduced and settled in this land, be not altogether groundless and unjust? ...
— The Querist • George Berkeley
... that my presentiment will be fulfilled." This idea gave him great uneasiness, and as I observed nothing which seemed to warrant his apprehensions, I omitted no opportunity of assuring him that they were groundless. But he would not listen to me, and all the time I was about him, he was haunted by this presentiment, which, in the end, was ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... temerity. He could not help thinking of how quickly any other girl he knew would have resented that implied acceptance of her claim to no beauty. But Pollyanna's first words showed him that even this lurking fear of his was quite groundless. ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... variation of winds, particularly the monsoons, or trade winds, and other periodical winds, of which the ancients had not the least conception; and by these helps we not only have it in our power to proceed much farther in our discoveries, but we are likewise delivered from a multitude of groundless apprehensions, that frightened them from prosecuting discoveries. We give no credit now to the fables that not only amused antiquity, but even obtained credit within a few generations. The authority of Pliny will not persuade us that there are any ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton
... advanced to a much higher station. Being a man of talent, he got another step again in a short time, and at length came back to Canton as Tsan-tuk or viceroy. The opium dealers and smugglers were greatly alarmed, shut up their shops, and secreted themselves for some time. It appeared their fears were groundless. This artful man, who formerly persecuted them from political motives, to insure his advancement, was now as mild and propitious as possible. Having arrived at an elevated station, with the certainty of rising still higher, he sought to enrich himself, in order to be more sure of gratifying ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... about Hester Harvey, of course, and so she was silent, blushing a little. He took her manner as an indication of guilt, and gritted his teeth with the pain that the discovery caused him, for he had been hoping, too—that his suspicions of her were groundless. ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... groundless:— Soon shall thy lord prefer thee to the rank Of his own consort; and unnumbered cares Befitting his imperial dignity Shall constantly engross thee. Then the bliss Of bearing him a son—a noble boy, Bright as the day-star—shall transport thy soul With new ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... Selwyn, fearing a surprise, and finding my apprehensions of danger were groundless, retired hastily into another walk, and soon after came to ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... before was only the polite attention, which I was always in the habit of paying to an interesting female, became now, to all outward appearance, an enthusiastic attachment. Unfortunately, too, the young lady, feeling indignant at the groundless and unjust ideas of Mrs. Hunt, too readily fell into my views, and appeared to be very much pleased with my open and increased assiduities. This added fuel to the fire; it led to the most unpleasant consequences, and laid the foundation for those little bickerings which ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... an act of almost reckless hardihood, fully in keeping with the rest of the Alabama's career. The event indeed proved the full danger of the adventure; whilst, at the same time, nothing could have more clearly showed how utterly groundless were the dastardly imputations upon the courage and prowess of her crew, poured out daily from the foul-mouthed organs of the Northern press. There could be no question of the fighting qualities, or ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... Virginia or any foreign plantation." Uneasiness was felt on board the ship, in consequence of a report being spread among the prisoners that thumbkins and other instruments of torture were to be used to them as implements of punishment. Peden assured his fellow-passengers that their fears were groundless, for, said he, neither thumbkins nor bodkins would hurt them. A tedious voyage of a fortnight brought them to London. When they were about to be put on board the vessel that was to carry them to Virginia, ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... were not groundless is shown by a passage in a letter sent the following day to Governor-General Augustin ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester
... extremely clear idea of what was to be accomplished, proposed that Mr. Burnit accept the chair pro tem.—where he would be out of the way. The unanimous support which this motion received was quite gratifying to the feelings of Mr. Burnit, proving at once that his fears had been not only groundless but ungenerous, and, in accepting the chair, he made them what he considered a very neat little speech indeed, striving the while to escape that circular smile with its diameter of yellow teeth and its intersecting crescent of stiff mustache; for he disliked meanly ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... anything from his behavior in the reading-room. For a couple of months Croizeau watched the retired custom-house official; but before the third month was out he had good reason to believe that his suspicions were groundless. He exerted his ingenuity to scrape an acquaintance with Denisart, came up with him in the street, and at length seized his opportunity to remark, 'It is ...
— A Man of Business • Honore de Balzac
... worship, they acknowledge a fellowship with them in something that death cannot destroy. The philosopher of modern times may say this is foolish, and may call for evidence that the notion of immortality is not groundless. It is perhaps impossible to satisfy him, because, in fact, he demands of reason what it is not the province of reason to afford. The notion is founded on other principles of the constitution which God has imparted to man, and these principles ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... evening, however, seemed to indicate that Mrs. Gray's fears were groundless. Sylvia and Thomas reached the Moving-Picture Palace without mishap, though they had left the Homestead so late owing to the latter's change of attire and the slow rate at which the mud and his lack of skill had ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes
... the baby, and caused, she says, by her fears for its safety. It came to us only in a roundabout way, through a servant in the house who keeps us in touch. The curious feature is that we can seem to get nothing definite from her about her fears. They may be groundless." ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... well how groundless are their apprehensions, but we are not even allowed to say so to our fellow-citizens of the south. So wild is their apprehension, that even such statesmen as Stephens, Johnson, Hill, Botts and Pettigrew, when they say, 'wait, ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... with cold logic; but reason availed nothing against the feeling that the North had but to stretch forth its mighty hand and crush them utterly. But all of this she concealed from Bill. She was ashamed of her fears, the groundless uneasiness. Yet it was a constant factor in her daily life, and it sapped her vitality as surely and steadily as lack of bodily nourishment ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... space that severs us is small, and all visible succor is distant. You believe yourself completely in my power; that you stand upon the brink of ruin. Such are your groundless fears. I cannot lift a finger to hurt you. Easier would it be to stop the moon in her course than to injure you. The power that protects you would crumble my sinews and reduce me to a heap of ashes in a moment, if I were to harbor a thought hostile ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... has been necessary to reject as groundless the theory that Jeremiah was exclusively a poet of a limited temper and a single form of verse and was not the author of any of the prose attributed to him, we must keep in mind that he did pour himself forth in verse; that it was natural for a rural priest such as ...
— Jeremiah • George Adam Smith
... his meaning, and most of the words are his own. The sentiment is surly very just and important; and happy would it be for many excellent persons, who, through wrong notions of the nature of faith, (which was never more misrepresented than now among some,) are perplexing themselves with the most groundless doubts and scruples, if it were more generally ...
— The Life of Col. James Gardiner - Who Was Slain at the Battle of Prestonpans, September 21, 1745 • P. Doddridge
... which nearly proved the means of commencing this new neighbourship by a duel; accusing General Stanley of having possessed himself by unfair means of Sir Laurence's confidence, and employed agents, underhand, to effect the purchase. In consequence of these groundless representations, it transpired in the country that the decayed baronet had actually volunteered the offer of the estate to the veteran proprietor of Stanley Manor; that he had solicited him to become the proprietor, and even accommodated him with peculiar facilities of payment, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... perhaps, was Mr Walcot. He knew that the whole family of the Rowlands remained in Deerbrook from Mrs Rowland's ostentation of confidence in his skill. He knew that Mr Rowland would have removed his family when the Greys departed, but that the lady had refused to go; and he felt how groundless was her confidence: not that he had pretended to more professional merit than he had believed himself to possess; but that, amidst this disease, he was like a willow-twig in the stream. He became so impressed ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... resources of transcendant skill, showing the wonders, the marvels of a moral courage never yet subdued. Despising all who thwarted him with ill-considered advice—neglecting all hostility, so he knew it to be groundless—laughing to scorn reviling enemies, jealous competitors, lukewarm friends, ay, hardest of all, to neglect despising even a fickle public, he cast his eye forwards as a man might—else he deserves not to command men—cast forward his eye to a time when ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington
... gentleman who spoke last is thoroughly satisfied, and satisfied out of the proceedings of ministry on their own favorite act, that his fears from a repeal are groundless. If he is not, I leave him, and the noble lord who sits by him, to settle the matter as well as they can together; for, if the repeal of American taxes destroys all our government in America,—he ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... spoken or written (if they admit no other more favourable interpretation), as, to my grief, I have spoken and written many things, and more than I can remember; all and everything I recant, and freely and honestly declare and profess to be groundless, false, and ...
— Pioneers of Science • Oliver Lodge
... howling, gnawing fiercely at the crack beneath the door and trying to tear his way out. Fearing he would break his little puppy teeth, or possibly die from frantic and persistent efforts to be free, I concluded to release him from the cabin. My fears that he would run away if left free were groundless. He made his way to my saddle, which lay on the ground near by, crawled under it, turned round beneath it, and thrust his little head from beneath the arch of the horn and lay down with a look of contentment, and also with an air which said, "I'll ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills
... beg your pardon, Mrs. Meredith, I'm rather concerned about you, and I want you to have somebody on hand I can rely on, sleeping in your flat at night. I dare say you think I am an old woman," he said as he saw her smile, "and that my fears are groundless, but you will agree that your own experience of last week will support the theory that anything may ...
— The Angel of Terror • Edgar Wallace
... groundless. She found Raoul more tender and affectionate than he had ever been. He saw the necessity of reassuring her, and winning his old place in her forgiving heart, before making ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... madness of jealousy at a mere groundless calumny, which had come across the sea distorted and magnified, wished to be divorced from Josephine; while he complained of woman's faithlessness, frivolity, and inconstancy; while he cursed all women as coquettes, he himself was guilty ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach
... the Bard sleep here indeed? Or is it but a groundless creed? What matters it?—I blame them not Whose Fancy in this lonely Spot 20 Was moved; and in such [1] way expressed Their notion of its perfect rest. A convent, even a hermit's cell, Would break the silence of this Dell: ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... of the South Sea and the directors of the Bank. A report which was circulated, that the latter had agreed to circulate six millions of the South Sea Company's bonds, caused the stock to rise to six hundred and seventy; but in the afternoon, as soon as the report was known to be groundless, the stock fell again to five hundred and eighty; the next day to five hundred and seventy, and so gradually to four hundred. [Gay (the poet), in that disastrous year, had a present from young Craggs of some South Sea ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... expected to have found swans swimming in the salt sea, in the midst of the Mediterranean? There is nothing that a Grecian would not devise in support of a favourite error. The legend from beginning to end is groundless: and though most speak of the music of swans as exquisite; yet some absolutely deny [195]the whole of it; and others are more moderate in their commendations. The watermen in Lucian give the preference to a jackdaw: ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume II. (of VI.) • Jacob Bryant
... was groundless. Disembarking about midnight, he whispered his name to the captain at the gate of Blacherne, and, leaving a soldan in the official palm, was admitted without examination. On the street there was nothing curious in an old ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... Court Martial was not opened till the 4th of June, 1744. It continued two days in session; when, after a strict scrutiny into the complaint, article by article of the nineteen specific charges, the board were of opinion that "the whole and every article thereof was groundless, false, and malicious." On the presentation of the Report to his Majesty he was pleased to order that the said Lieutenant Colonel Cook should be ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris
... against his will: "And to think that they could be so unmoved by the suffering of that poor girl, their own victim, and so untouched by the example of Miss Farwell; and then that they should give such grave consideration and be so influenced by absolutely groundless and vicious idle gossip! And that the church of Christ, that Christianity itself, should be so wholly in the hands of people so unspeakably blind, so—contemptibly mean and small in their conceptions of the religion of ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright
... they anticipated that a certain detection would follow any such attempt at imposition. The leaders in this Convention knew full well that there is intelligence enough in Connecticut to meet them on any complaint, and to shew that it is groundless. They, therefore, prudently decline to be explicit, and yielding to us that the Government is now well administered, they shew a great anxiety for the safety of the "next generation." What an astonishing display of philanthropy!! Bishop and Wolcott are not at ease in their hearts while ...
— Count The Cost • Jonathan Steadfast
... in the Somme battle for the second time, and as we suddenly left Pommier on the 29th October—our final destination unknown—we naturally thought it probable that we, too, should soon be once more in the thick of the fighting. However, our fears were groundless, and we moved due West, not South. Our first night we spent in Mondicourt, and then moved the next day in pouring rain to Halloy, where we stayed two days. On the 1st November we marched 14 miles through Doullens to Villers L'Hopital, on the Auxi le Chateau road, where we found ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... that strength bestow'd; For know, vain man! thy valour is from God. Haste, launch thy vessels, fly with speed away; Rule thy own realms with arbitrary sway; I heed thee not, but prize at equal rate Thy short-lived friendship, and thy groundless hate. Go, threat thy earth-born Myrmidons:—but here(56) 'Tis mine to threaten, prince, and thine to fear. Know, if the god the beauteous dame demand, My bark shall waft her to her native land; But then prepare, imperious prince! prepare, Fierce as thou art, to yield thy captive ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... of that kind which most deeply wounds a woman. How it originated, it was at the time, and is of course now, impossible to say. Probably its source was nothing more than a sneer, but it bore Dead-Sea fruit. A slander more utterly groundless never was propagated. It broke off an engagement that promised much happiness with a gentleman, then eminent, and since famous, as an author: not that he at any time gave credence to the foul and wicked rumor; but to her "inquiry" was a sufficient ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... accordingly acquitted. Now, if upon the enquiry thus instituted, and thus conducted, it appears, either that no such crime was committed, or that the suspicion entertained against the accused is wholly groundless, or that, however positively accused, if the balance of testimony be strongly in favour of his innocence, it is the duty of the magistrate to discharge him. But if, on the other hand, the case seems ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various
... Berriat Saint-Prix, in his "Jeanne d'Arc," proves, page 341 et seq., that the imputations against Brother Richard are groundless, and that he could exercise ...
— Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary • Voltaire
... footfall of his friend, and after a while had perceived, or had thought that he had perceived, that the sound was discontinued. It seemed to him that Wharton had altogether lost his senses;—the insult to himself had been so determined and so absolutely groundless! He had striven his best to conquer the man's ill-humour by good-natured forbearance, and had only suggested that Wharton was perhaps tipsy in order to give him some excuse. But if his companion were really ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... part of his brother Moss's farm, strongly contributed to his dissatisfaction with that unlucky agriculturist. If this wasn't Moss's fallow, it might have been; Basset was all alike; it was a beggarly parish, in Mr. Tulliver's opinion, and his opinion was certainly not groundless. Basset had a poor soil, poor roads, a poor non-resident landlord, a poor non-resident vicar, and rather less than half a curate, also poor. If any one strongly impressed with the power of the human mind ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... were, in this instance, groundless, for Eleanor played a perfectly fair game from start to finish, and proved herself a powerful antagonist. Her serves were as straight and accurate as a boy's, and she played with great spirit and agility. Indeed, the sides were so evenly matched that junior excitement rose high ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... the readers of NOTES AND QUERIES, who suffer from depression of spirits, confusion, headache, blushing, groundless fears, unfitness for business or society, blood to the head, failure of memory, delusions, suicidal thoughts, fear of insanity, &c., will call on, or correspond with, REV. DR. WILLIS MOSELEY, who, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 185, May 14, 1853 • Various
... V. and Gascoyne (p. 373) together after the Prince's accession, because Gascoyne died in the life-time of Henry IV. This view has generally been acquiesced in, and the powerfully delineated scene of our great dramatist has been pronounced altogether the groundless fiction of an event which could not by possibility have transpired. The whole question turns upon the date of Gascoyne's death. He was buried in Harewood Church in Yorkshire; and Fuller gives the ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... and fears that had for a time possessed her mind in relation to that death. The shadow of that old ghastly terror sometimes came between her and Mr. Sheldon, even now, though she had long ago assured herself that the terror had been alike groundless and unreasonable. ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... eager half-turn. "He will want to embrace me," thought our young man with a deep recoil of all his being, while his limbs seemed too heavy to move. But it was a groundless alarm. He had to do now with a generation of conspirators who did not kiss each other on both cheeks; and raising an arm that felt like lead he dropped his hand into a largely-outstretched palm, fleshless and hot as if dried ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... that some of the charges of lycanthropy were groundless, being based on malice—which, by the by, is no argument for the non-existence of lycanthropy, since it is acknowledged that accusations of all sorts, having been based on malice, have been equally groundless—there is nothing in the nature of written evidence ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... repeat the word "art," but said "wert," in heaven. Inferring from every circumstance that their fate was extremely precarious, the minister resolved not to puff the fairies up with presumptuous, and, perhaps, groundless expectations. Accordingly, addressing himself to the unhappy fairy, who was all anxiety to know the nature of his sentiments, the reverend gentleman told him that he could not take it upon him to give them any hopes of pardon, as their crime was of so deep ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous
... questions of great public interest, all given under the solemn sense of duty, impressed by an oath to support the constitution, and by the sacred obligations of a public trust, to defend myself against charges so groundless and unprovoked is, in my judgment, a duty of respect to you, no less than a duty of self-vindication to me. I declare to you that not one of the votes which General Smyth has culled from an arduous service of five years in the Senate of the Union, to stigmatize them in the face ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... security neither originated in their valour nor our misconduct. Such were the desponding reflections which at this time arose, on the review and comparison of our remaining weakness with our original strength: And, indeed, our fears were far from being groundless, or disproportionate to our feeble and almost desperate condition: For, though the final event proved more honourable than we foreboded, yet the intermediate calamities did likewise surpass our most gloomy apprehensions; ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... I still say," said Winifred, sobbing. "Let us retire to rest, dear husband; your fears are groundless. I had hoped long since that your affliction would have passed away, and I still hope that it eventually will; so take heart, Peter, and let us retire to rest, for ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... of an army in the immediate vicinity of the capital—without the knowledge of himself, the head of the royal military establishment; while Chancellor de l'Hospital said that "it was a capital crime for any servant to alarm his prince with false intelligence, or give him groundless suspicions ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... coast, and is cultivated successfully at the height of from 7000 to 13,200 feet above the level of the sea. The assertion of some travellers, that barley was known to the Peruvians before the arrival of the Spaniards, is groundless. It is true that barley is sometimes found in pots in Indian graves. Those graves, however, as I have had repeated opportunities of being convinced, belong, without exception, to modern times, ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... the poet is generally undervalued. He is apt to be regarded as an unpractical, or even an eccentric and valueless member of society. Too often the eccentricities of genius afford some basis for this prejudice; but it is wholly groundless in the case of the largest and most gifted of the poetic race. High poetic gifts are favorable to the noblest types of manhood. The great poet, beyond all other men, possesses an intuitive insight into truth, depth of feeling, ...
— Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism • F. V. N. Painter
... of my house in this surreptitious fashion unmolested, from regard to old attachments; but you shall not again interfere in my family arrangements. The charges that you have, I see now, been the means of making against Mrs. Harrington, are groundless. I will not have a word spoken—mark ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... calm, so master of himself, that Wharton perceived how groundless must have been his first notion. Whatever might be Mr. Caryll's motives, it was plain from his most perfect composure that they were not motives of fear. His ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... venerable old man continually addressed the young general as "my son." The peasants of Pavia, having revolted because their fanaticism had been excited by false assertions that the French wished to destroy their religion, the Archbishop of Milan, in order to prove that their fears were groundless, often showed himself in a carriage with ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... with all sail set." The thoughts of the gradual loss of his faculties haunted him with curious insistency. He conceived a dislike for his own room, could not bear to be alone, and hung with pathetic eagerness to the companionship of the few whom he held dearest. His fear was groundless. To the end his mind remained clear; and on the 29th of November, 1859, he "went down with all ...
— Washington Irving • Henry W. Boynton
... running a brilliant career, and sure of a bright future in any event." In 1863 Colfax was elected Speaker of the House, and in 1868 vice-president. Four years later Colfax was implicated in a corruption charge, which though found groundless by the Senate Judiciary Committee, cast a shadow over the ...
— The Greatest Highway in the World • Anonymous
... George's ascendancy over him—quite felt by George—was so absolute that he could think of nothing now but the exceeding great joy of finding his fears groundless, and of delivering himself up to his son's guidance in the assurance that the void in his heart was filled, and that his wager not only would be held as won, but was being already paid. How they had found out, why he was not to speak as he ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... that county; and this not merely amongst the starving people, but amongst the most respectable and intelligent persons with whom he conversed. He—a man not likely to take a narrow or prejudiced view of any subject—was of opinion that those complaints were not groundless. The officials, he says, instead of extending the works in Mayo, and feeding the people, "are employed in diverting public attention by prating of subscriptions, paltering about Queen's letters and English poor-boxes, and frittering away the strength of public opinion and ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke
... Mademoiselle, I assure you that your fears are quite groundless. I am proud to belong to the Guard of Maasau, and they have so far shown no intention of rejecting me. As for duels, if there happened to be one—are not affairs common in Maasau? And afterwards, fewer funerals take place than one would suppose likely! Besides, M. Selpdorf's wishes ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... a bargain. But as I was out of all fear of being ill-treated under the protection of so great and good an empress, the ornament of nature, the darling of the world, the delight of her subjects, the phoenix of the creation, so I hoped my late master's apprehensions would appear to be groundless; for I already found my spirits revive, by the influence of her ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... father so bright and animated in all the five years of their secluded life, and she began to hope that his fears regarding his failing health were groundless after all. She, too, enjoyed the young stranger's conversation, although she did not join in it. She sat by, with her dainty embroidery in her hands, listening, and showing by her expressive face and shining eyes how rare a pleasure such ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... unbroken—and I began to hope that our alarm was groundless—at least, so far as an ambuscade was concerned. Just where the shot had been fired from I could not tell, for the wind had quickly drifted the smoke away; but as I watched alertly I detected a slight movement in the evergreen-clad face of the hill on the left, at a point some distance ahead, and ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon
... race which cherished it has been long since extinct. It may be stated, however, that a similar suspicion crossed the mind of Humboldt when he was engaged in collecting the traditions of the Indians of the Orinoco; but that on further reflection and inquiry he dismissed the doubt as groundless. He even set himself to examine whether the district was not a fossiliferous one, and whether beds of sea shells, or deposits charged with the petrified remains of corals or of fishes, might not have originated among ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... would," says Bishop Percy (Mallet's North. Antiq., ii. p. 72.), "be a curious subject of disquisition, to inquire what could have given rise to so arbitrary and groundless a notion as the singing of swans," {476} which "hath not wanted assertors from almost every ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 59, December 14, 1850 • Various
... Pope Clement VI. in two bulls, in the first of which he ordered that the Jews should not be made the victims of groundless charges or injured in person or property without the sentence of a lawful judge. The second affirmed the innocence of the Jews in the persecution then going on and ordered the bishops to excommunicate all ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... stab Desdemona, Maria perceived that her father's dagger was not a stage sham, but a genuine weapon. Frantic with terror, she screamed "Papa, papa, for the love of God, do not kill me!" Her terrors were groundless, for the substitution of the real for a theatrical dagger was a mere accident. The audience knew no difference, as they supposed Maria's Spanish exclamation to be good operatic Italian, and they applauded at the fine dramatic point made ...
— Great Singers, Second Series - Malibran To Titiens • George T. Ferris
... don't you? Well, then, it is nothing; don't ask me." And, noting the quick change in his face—"No, no; it is not what you think. How quickly you are hurt! My apprehension is not about you; it concerns myself. And it is quite groundless. I know what I must do; I know!" she repeated bitterly. "And there will always be a straight path to the end; clear and straight, until I go out as nameless as I came in to all this.... Don't touch my hand, please.... I'm trying to think.... I can't, if we are in contact.... And you ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... at this place. They examined minutely the spot of encampment, to form a judgment of the number of canoes that had preceded them; and they advanced, armed, and with great caution, through the woods. Their fears, however, on this occasion, were fortunately groundless. ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 1 • John Franklin
... existing on the earth, in the air, or the waters, who were the object of such an unintermitting, general, and relentless persecution as the Jews of this period. Upon the slightest and most unreasonable pretences, as well as upon accusations the most absurd and groundless, their persons and property were exposed to every turn of popular fury; for Norman, Saxon, Dane, and Briton, however adverse these races were to each other, contended which should look with greatest detestation upon a people, whom it was ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... night, though I spent till twelve at night with W. Hewer to consider of our business: and we find it not only most free from any blame of our side, but so horrid scandalous on the other, to make so groundless a complaint, and one so shameful to him, that it could not but let me see that there is no need of my being troubled; but such is the weakness of my nature, that I could not help it, which vexes me, showing me how unable I am to ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... very alarming," she said soothingly, wishing to avoid distressing him needlessly by communicating what might really be only, as she hoped, a groundless fear on her part. "I do not feel exactly ill, dear. I was only speaking about the natural frail tenure of this mortal life of ours. This saying 'Good-bye' to you too, my darling, makes me infected with morbid fear and nervous anxiety. Fancy me nervous, Eric—I ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson
... making good the above-mentioned conditional covenant, the board proceeded to unnecessary warmth, and found themselves involved still more and more in animosities, and those irregularities which naturally follow groundless controversy. He would therefore take upon himself the hazard and the power of the whole affair, accountable however to the board, as to the money part; and yet would bind himself to pay for three years to come, a profit of forty shillings per annum upon every share, and then deliver back ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... unrelated wound. Elfrida felt herself armed by it to face a sea of troubles. Not absolutely, but almost, she convinced herself on the spot that her solemn choice of an art had been immature, and to some extent groundless and unwarrantable; and she washed all her brushes with a mechanical and melancholy sense that it was for the last time. It was easier than she would have dreamed for her to decide to take Frank Parke's advice and go to London. ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... discover that basenese we are so subiect to in detracting from what al others do'es but ourselves in that groundless censur of many things in this harangue which our Alex'r had wt another ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... eagerness for European fame connected him with Voltaire and the French infidels, whose wit and wickedness had made them the leaders of philosophical fashion. But there is a principle of belief in human nature which revenges itself on the infidel. There are no men more liable to groundless fears, than those who reject the object of legitimate awe. The man who will not believe in a deity, has often believed in witchcraft; and those who will not acknowledge a Providence, have often trembled before a conjurer. At this ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348 • Various
... hold an opinion diametrically opposite, and hope to convince the reader that the allegations against the German writers are entirely groundless. In no German play that I have ever seen is there to be found any thing of this species. The true character of the German theatre is the very antipodes to this. Strong bold sentiment—incidents numerous and interesting—a ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol. I. No. 3. March 1810 • Various
... flowed over her to-night, a tide come from she knew not where. Making an effort to stem it, she recalled her happiness with Maurice after that day of the Tarantella. How groundless had really been her melancholy then! She had imagined him escaping from her, but he had remained with her, and loved her. He had been good to her until the end, tender and faithful. If she had ever had a rival, that rival had been Sicily. Always her ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... he can be put on trial for the charge against him: one by a discharge ordered by the committing magistrate, and one by the refusal of the grand jury to return "a true bill." A grand jury is more apt to throw out a charge as groundless than a single magistrate. He feels the full weight of undivided responsibility. If he err by discharging the prisoner, he knows that it may let a guilty man go free, untried. If he err by committing him for trial, he knows that, if innocent, the jury are quite sure ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD
... the crew of the Bounty mutinied against him, and set him, half-naked, in an open boat, with certain of his men who remained faithful to him, and ran away with the ship. Their principal motive for doing so was an idea, whether true or groundless the writer cannot say, that Bligh was 'no better than themselves'; he was certainly neither a lord's illegitimate, nor possessed of twenty thousand pounds. The writer knows what he is writing about, having ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... not so groundless as you think, dear. I have lain, thinking them over, all night. Perhaps Beata saw things truly ...
— Rosmerholm • Henrik Ibsen
... extending both ways, so as to bind their respective families together, and give one the power and means of evil which could in no other way be obtained. In view of all these circumstances, then, I feel that a calamity is in store for us. God grant that my fears and forebodings may prove groundless." ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... still more vulnerable at another point. The fundamental assumption on which it is based is utterly groundless. It amounts to this, that all knowledge of causes, whether efficient or final, is interdicted to man, and incapable of being reached by any exertion of his faculties.[87] He tells us that Theology is impossible, for ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan
... one piece, one of the party being represented in the dress of a hussar, and another in that of a running footman. This incident I mention, because the performance, which is now in my possession, gave birth to a thousand groundless reports circulated ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... excitement was caused by the return of a single swan, and much more so when a deep blood-red stain was observed upon its breast. As might be expected, this unlooked-for occurrence occasioned grave suspicions even amongst those who had no great faith in omens; and that such fears were not groundless was soon abundantly clear, for in less than a week the lord of Closeburn Castle died suddenly. Thereupon the swan vanished, and was seen no more for some years, when it again appeared to announce the loss of one of the house ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer
... its most puerile attempt to gleam, is admired and recorded by its well-disciplined constituency. Not only that, but at the first timid blink of the sun the true Scotsman remarks smilingly, "I think now we shall be having settled weather!" It is a pathetic optimism, beautiful but quite groundless, and leads one to believe in the story that when Father Noah refused to take Sandy into the ark, he sat down philosophically outside, saying, with a glance at the clouds, "Aweel! the day's jist aboot the ord'nar', an' I wouldna won'er if we saw ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... and after he had been assured on this head, he felt a solemn presentiment, first, that the red bag was mislaid, and next that the striped bag had been stolen, and then that the brown-paper parcel 'had come untied.' At length when he had received ocular demonstration of the groundless nature of each and every of these suspicions, he consented to climb up to the roof of the coach, observing that now he had taken everything off his mind, he felt quite ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... yourself with empty hopes." With tears Juno responded, "What if thou shouldst grant in thy heart what in words thou dost refuse, and continue the life of Turnus for its natural duration? I fear much that a speedy end awaits the brave youth; but oh! I pray that I may be misled by groundless alarms, and that thou, to whom all power belongs, may alter thy ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various
... life had been devoted,—in publishing a Life of their illustrious parent, thought fit to charge Thomas Clarkson with having suppressed his services while he exaggerated his own; and not content with bringing a charge utterly groundless, (as it was instantly proved,) they deemed it worthy of their subject and of their name, to drag forth into the light of day a private correspondence of a delicate nature, with the purpose of proving that their father and others had assisted him with money, and that he had ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... copy from the "London Queen," if I were not conscious that the monster who can write and print such a sentence would not hesitate to cable a thunderbolt at an offender on the slightest provocation. Judge, if my fears are groundless: "But some few people contract the ugly habit of making use of these expressions unconsciously and continuously, perpetually interlarding ...
— The Verbalist • Thomas Embly Osmun, (AKA Alfred Ayres)
... Mr Harding well knew what that pressure meant. The bishop had no further argument to adduce; he could not fight for the cause as his son would do; he could not prove all the precentor's doubts to be groundless; but he could sympathise with his friend, and he did so; and Mr Harding felt that he had received that for which he came. There was another period of silence, after which the bishop asked, with a degree of irritable energy, very unusual with him, whether this "pestilent ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope
... as a positive entity is proved by Inference, also is groundless. But the inference was actually set forth!—True; but it was set forth badly. For the reason you employed for proving ajna is a so-called contradictory one (i.e. it proves the contrary of what it is meant to prove), in so far as it proves what is not desired and what is different from ajna ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... it will not occupy the attention of the world like Lord George's. There will soon be another trial of another sort on another madman, an Earl Ferrers, who has murdered his steward. He was separated by Parliament from his wife, a very pretty woman, whom he married with no fortune, for the most groundless barbarity, and now killed his steward for having been evidence for her; but his story and person are too wretched and despicable to give you the detail. He will be dignified by a solemn ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... the balance was greatly the other way. It has been said that he abused the confidence reposed in him by women; that he encouraged affection which he did not reciprocate for artistic purposes. The charge is utterly groundless; and in the case of Bettine has been refuted by irrefragable proof. To say that he was wanting in love, heartless, cold, is ridiculously false. Yet the charge is constantly reiterated in the face of facts,—reiterated with undoubting assurance and a ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... LETTER BETA}) What we have said is sufficient to disprove the groundless assertion that the Catholic doctrine concerning the meritoriousness of good works derogates from the merits of Christ and fosters "self-righteousness." Would it not be far more derogatory to the honor of our Saviour to assume that He failed to obtain for ...
— Grace, Actual and Habitual • Joseph Pohle
... in her own mind; but although circumstances did look tellingly against the beauty who had come to Gray Gables to be Dorothy Glenn's companion, yet she had tried to make herself believe that her suspicions were groundless. ...
— Pretty Madcap Dorothy - How She Won a Lover • Laura Jean Libbey
... naturally shy and not given to talk much in company, and people fancied, knowing that she was clever, that she was on the watch for good material for books from their conversation. Her intimate friends knew how groundless was the apprehension and that it wronged her.' She was not only shy: she was also at times very grave. Her niece Anna is inclined to think that Cassandra was the more equably cheerful of the two sisters. There was, undoubtedly, a quiet intensity of nature in Jane for which some critics ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh
... returned Kenric, much relieved. "Old Elspeth Blackfell was but playing me with her groundless forewarnings of danger. Well, get me some meat and a bowl of milk, Duncan, while I go up and see this uncle of mine. He has seen much of the world, and methinks his discourse must be full of ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... honesty; indeed, we were well aware of the predatory propensities of our neighbours; but we seemed destined to experience more annoyance from the great apprehension of being attacked which existed amongst our followers, than from any well-founded anticipation of it; their fears were not totally groundless, as it must be confessed that to a needy and disorganized population the bait of a lac ...
— A Peep into Toorkisthhan • Rollo Burslem
... groundless. On the third day, Gard quietly opened his eyes on Nance, who had barely left his bedside since the Senechal went down to La Closerie himself and brought her back with ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... groundless scare of the impecunious Major was a trifling affair compared with the grand scare that overtook the whole people along the lake in the autumn of 1812, at the time of Hull's surrender One day a fleet of vessels was seen bearing down upon the coast. It was first noticed in the vicinity of Huron by ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin
... profession was competent to fulfil the expectations that had been formed in the public mind. The opinion generally entertained that Mr Robins was the author of the Account of Anson's Voyage, might have contributed to this very groundless notion; and the parties might have hoped, that a person of Dr Hawkesworth's reputation in the literary world, would not fail to fabricate a work that should at least rival that excellent production. It would be unfair not to apprise ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... tormented himself with groundless apprehensions of impending death, on which account he was accustomed to require the attendance of his physician at the hour of midnight, and that his imagination conjured up strange fancies about the cross in the market-place at Huntingdon,[1] hallucinations which ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc
... contiguity, it rests upon the assumption that causes "operate," i.e. that they are in some obscure way analogous to volitions. And, as in the case of temporal contiguity, the inferences drawn from this maxim are wholly groundless. ...
— Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays • Bertrand Russell
... most emphasized as a warning against the voluntary system has not attended this system in America. The fear that a clergy supported by the free gifts of the people would prove subservient and truckling to the hand by which it is fed has been proved groundless. Of course there have been time-servers in the American ministry, as in every other; but flagrant instances of the abasement of a whole body of clergy before the power that holds the purse and controls promotion are to ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... and rush, and reed: Through tangling thickets headlong on they go, Then stop, and listen for their fancied foe; The hindmost still the growing panic spreads, Repeated fright the first alarm succeeds, Till Folly's wages, wounds and thorns, they reap: Yet glorying in their fortunate escape, Their groundless terrors by degrees soon cease, And Night's dark reign restores their wonted peace. For now the gale subsides, and from each bough The roosting pheasant's short but frequent crow Invites to rest; and huddling side by side, The herd ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield
... from a jealousy of this kind, not at that juncture altogether groundless, and to guard against everything from whence the necessity of an High Steward in the case of an impeachment might be inferred, that the Commons proposed and the Lords readily agreed to the amendment in the Steward's commission ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... explained, after the first greetings. "You and I have discussed the Consolidated Companies upon various occasions; I have watched its operations carefully, and I am free to say that my early apprehensions have thus far proved groundless. I believe that I have acted conscientiously in pushing the investigations and prosecutions against those combinations which are really a menace to the country; but there are some who disagree with me, and flaunt the Consolidated Companies in my face as an evidence ...
— The Lever - A Novel • William Dana Orcutt
... to the cabin, he found that his sister had fainted away through terror. Volatile salts, and the assurance that all her future fears would be entirely groundless, had the effect of restoring her very speedily. * ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... and the church is called Christ) (1 Cor 12:12). But note, That fervent prayer ends in faith and confidence in God. They called themselves by the name; they counted themselves not from a vain and groundless opinion, but through the faith they had in the mercy of God, The saints and holy people ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... but within the hall, Mrs. Nutt gave her husband a "caudle" lecture, but with little effect upon him. She had nothing but groundless suspicion; he had the inward satisfaction of a good conscience on the points respecting ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... logic of the Rebels of the South and of the Democratic party of the North. Mr. Johnson believes that the present Congress intends to impeach him and remove him from office. Admit that this fear is groundless, yet, if he entertains it, he will act as he would act if such were the purpose of the two Houses. Hence he must destroy the authority of Congress. Hence he arraigns its members as traitors. Hence he made the significant, revolutionary, and startling ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... are melted away by it into the airiest dream-sketches, our most positive and glaring facts are blankly blotted out, and a fresh, clean sheet left for some new fantasy to be written upon it, as groundless as the rest; our solid land dissolves in cloud, and cloud assumes the stability of land. For, after all, the only really tangible thing we possess is man's Will; and let the presence and action of that ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... Her eagerness to return to him had been so intense that it had made her afraid. Yet she had returned, been with him again. Her fear in Africa that they would perhaps never be together again in their Sicilian home had been groundless. She remembered how it had often tormented her, especially at night in the dark. She had passed agonizing hours, for no reason. Her imagination had persecuted her. Now it was trying to persecute her more cruelly. Suddenly ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens
... no means improbable. . . . Two sloops were stationed to watch, yet Cameron landed.' Writing to Mann (April 27, 1753), Horace Walpole remarks: 'What you say you have heard of strange conspiracies fomented by OUR NEPHEW [Frederick] is not entirely groundless.' He adds that Cameron has been taken while ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... was just over when she made her application, and it was thought that some of the books had been taken away by a refugee. Still, there were a plenty of persons to supply traditions and conjecture; and so anxious were she and her husband to trace these groundless reports to their confirmation or refutation, that much money and time were thrown away in the fruitless attempts. At length, one of the old attendants of the children's department was discovered, who professed ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... the neighbors had long surmised that Tilly owed the Squire a groundless and secret grudge, as he did many others in the town. He always seemed to be cooking spleen and getting up grudges. He enjoyed apparent slights, and fancied insults, as a hungry dog his dinner; they helped him so much in hatching quarrels ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... the German, French, and English services, not doubting that I should meet her at one of them. All my researches were absolutely fruitless; my security on the last point was proved by the event to be equally groundless with my other calculations. I stood at the door of each chapel after the service, and waited till every individual had come out, scrutinizing every gown draping a slender form, peering under every bonnet covering a young head. In vain; I saw girlish figures pass ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... spring water, studded with groups of high rocks of varied size and shape, overgrown by tall pines, birch, scrubby underbrush, ferns, and moss. We had been getting on with such comparative ease that we began to think our fears of the "corduroy road" had been groundless; but before night we experienced the wisdom of the warning not to "halloo before we were out of the bush." We took our lunch on some flat rocks, near a place known on the road as "six-mile shanty;" not without difficulty, as the dogs, like ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... determined by the operation of an entirely different set of economic forces. The loose opinion that it must be to the interest of a Trust or other monopoly to sell at the same price as would be fixed by competition is quite groundless. ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson
... canvas of the period like "Labourers after Dinner", we cry out, "What madness! were we ever as mad as that?" The impressionists have been often accused of a desire to dispense with the element of beauty, but the accusation has always seemed to me to be quite groundless, and even memory of a certain portrait by Mr. Walter Sickert does not cause me to falter in this opinion. Until I saw Mr. Clausen's "Labourers" I did not fully realise how terrible a thing art becomes when divorced from beauty, grace, ...
— Modern Painting • George Moore
... in, and the rattler struck him before he could draw his hand out. He had a clown make-up on, so I couldn't tell whether he was pale or not when he came to me a few minutes later and held out his hand, but there was a queer expression on his face and I knew that my apprehensions had not been groundless. ...
— Side Show Studies • Francis Metcalfe
... air, vapor; bubble &c. 353; "baseless fabric of a vision" [Tempest]; mockery. hollowness, blank; void &c. (absence) 187. inanity, fool's paradise. V. vanish, evaporate, fade, dissolve, melt away; disappear &c. 449. Adj. unsubstantial; baseless, groundless; ungrounded; without foundation, having no foundation. visionary &c. (imaginary) 515; immaterial &c. 137; spectral &c. 980; dreamy; shadowy; ethereal, airy; cloud built, cloud formed; gossamery, illusory, insubstantial, unreal. vacant, vacuous; empty &c. 187; eviscerated; blank, hollow; nominal; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... sweet by leagues of wild flowerets, gave tang and savour to the breath. In the sky was a great, round, mellow searchlight which we knew to be no moon, but the dark lantern of summer, who came to hunt northward the cowering spring. In the nearest corral a flock of sheep lay silent until a groundless panic would send a squad of them huddling together with a drumming rush. For other sounds a shrill family of coyotes yapped beyond the shearing-pen, and whippoorwills twittered in the long grass. But even these dissonances hardly rippled the clear torrent of ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... Their fears proved entirely groundless. By some inexplicable means, the two waifs, thrown thus strangely upon the protection of Widow Hardyng, managed to exist without either the aid or sympathy of the rest of the town. And Clemence, as the days grew cooler, rallied, ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... no wise like him and do not stand for the things he stands for. At the same time, the so-called "sports" might well reply that it is not with any of the really admirable qualities of the "unco guid" that they quarrel, but their too narrow interpretations of virtue and duty and their groundless generalization as to ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser
... Thomas, who evidently thought Roger's fear groundless, was laughing, but I could not hear his reply. In any case he gave no order to prepare for action until the boat came within earshot and the captain abruptly hailed him and ordered him to trip anchor and prepare ...
— The Mutineers • Charles Boardman Hawes
... forward against the spears, Brinton stood alongside of the stump with one hand inside of it, his forefinger playing with the trigger of the revolver. The apprehension of a recurrence of the critical scene which has been narrated was however groundless. Brutus dutifully leaped forward and smashed the brittle spears, without hesitation, and calmly suffered himself to be embraced as a "noble ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various
... what you are talking about," said Eleanore, a great burden falling from her heart as she realised that her initial fears were groundless. "By the monster you evidently mean Daniel Nothafft. ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... noticed it. Sylvia, who was serving something, did not. Henry had thought he had arrived at a knowledge of Horace's suspicions, which in themselves seemed to him perfectly groundless, and now that he had, as he supposed, proved them to be so, he was profoundly puzzled. Before he had gone to Horace's assistance. Now he did not see his way clear towards doing so, and saw no necessity for it. He ate ...
— The Shoulders of Atlas - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... George's picture, which hung there as usual, with the portrait of the boy underneath. "It was cruel of him. If I had forgiven it, ought he to have spoken? No. And it is from his own lips that I know how wicked and groundless my jealousy was; and that you were pure—oh, yes, you were ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of jealousy or spite. Hence it was a favourite expedient to represent him as the tool of more designing men—as one whose simplicity had been imposed upon, and who had been thrust forward against his better judgment to do work in which he had no heart. This theory is not only entirely groundless, but entirely unnecessary; because the action which he took on this question can readily be explained by a reference to convictions he had held all his life, and to circumstances which seemed to him ...
— Principal Cairns • John Cairns
... yet England yielded. It took a little time, but arbitration settled it in the end—at about the same time that we flatly declined to arbitrate our quarrel with Spain. History will not acquit us of groundless meddling and arrogance in this matter, while England comes out of it having again shown in the end both forbearance and good manners. Before another Venezuelan incident in 1902, I take up a burning ...
— A Straight Deal - or The Ancient Grudge • Owen Wister
... Frank's side again, fearing that one of the fallen men might arise and return to the fray. But these fears were groundless. All four were beyond human aid, as Lord Hastings found after ...
— The Boy Allies Under the Sea • Robert L. Drake
... was a plagiarist; and no apologetic words that, upon the assumption stated, "Cymbeline" did not owe a very large share of its total effect to "Philaster," can make less the gravity of the charge, and if the assumption is groundless or even probably groundless, no excuse remains to the critic ...
— The Critics Versus Shakspere - A Brief for the Defendant • Francis A. Smith
... its own strength, its own virtue, or whatsoever it had before. Now, saith the soul, that faith I thought I had, it is but fancy; that hope I thought I had, I see it is by hypocritical, but vain and groundless hope. [These things would be too tedious to enlarge upon]. Now the soul sees it hath by nature no saving faith, no saving hope, no grace at all by nature, by the first covenant. Now it crieth out, How many promises have I broken! and how many times have I resolved in vain, when I was sick at ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... across the chapters giving information about what took place in the State of Mississippi during the period of Reconstruction. I detected so many statements and representations which to my own knowledge were absolutely groundless that I decided to read carefully the entire work. I regret to say that, so far as the Reconstruction period is concerned, it is not only inaccurate and unreliable but it is the most biased, partisan and prejudiced historical work I have ever read. In his preface to volume six, ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various
... of Aristotle, which was shown by the Spanish scholar Sepulveda to be very incorrect. He wrote a dialogue entitled Medices Legatus, sive de Exilio (1522), in connexion with which he was charged with plagiarism by his personal enemy, Paulus Manutius. The accusation, which Tiraboschi has shown to be groundless, was that he had taken the finest passages in the work from Cicero's lost treatise De Gloria, and had then destroyed the only existing copy of the original in order to escape detection. His contemporaries speak very ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... for a little while, the scene was Bedlam-like in its passion and anarchy. In the midst of it all, facing the violent howls of the excited Tories, pale, disturbed, hotly angry underneath all the composure of language and tone, Mr. Gladstone exposed the shameful and entirely groundless misrepresentation. Mr. Balfour's better angel intervened; he got ashamed of himself, and at once apologized. But the hurricane of passion which had been let loose was not to be so easily appeased; and when, presently, ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... command since my enlistment, I had been seeing him daily. "Old Jack," at a distance, was as familiar to me as one of the battery guns, but I had never met him, and felt much awe at being ushered into his presence. This feeling, however, was groundless, for he was seemingly so much embarrassed by the interview that I really felt sorry for him before he dismissed me with my discharge papers, ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son
... it wholly groundless, or my fears altogether imaginary, that the abolishing of Christianity may perhaps bring the Church into danger, or at least put the senate to the trouble of another securing vote. I desire I may not be mistaken; I am far from presuming ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... we are quite at a loss to imagine how a notion so obviously groundless has ever had a single supporter; for, if a distinct effect implies a distinct cause, we do not see why distinct terms should not be employed to express the difference, or how the legitimate term for one ...
— Lectures on Art • Washington Allston
... Dion's Virtue and Integrity could not have stifled the Care I have taken in Fifty Places, nor the many Cautions I have given, that I might not offend or be misunderstood: On the Contrary, he would have made use of them, to undeceive his Friends, and prevented their groundless Fears and senseless Insinuations. If Dion had read what I have said about the Fire of London, Nothing but his Politeness could have hinder'd him from bursting out into a loud Laughter at the judicious Remark of the Learned Crito, where he points ...
— A Letter to Dion • Bernard Mandeville
... house to the woodshed, and shivered down into a miserable heap. There in the darkness he seemed to see things, for the first time in his life, quite as they were. His gaze, accustomed to the glittering promise of the future, peered fearfully into the past, and reviewed the long line of groundless hopes, of empty projects, of self-deceptions. Shorn of its petty shams and deceits, and stripped of its counterfeit armor of conceit, his life lay naked before him, ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice
... said Lee Fu, 'to examine carefully the forepeak of this vessel. I had chartered her one time, and felt alarmed for her safety until I had seen the interior fastenings of these great windows that looked out into the deep sea. But my alarm was groundless. There was a most ingenious device for strengthening the bows where they had been weakened by the cutting of the ports. Four or five timbers had, of course, been severed; but these were reproduced on the port itself, and the whole was fashioned like a massive door. It lifted upward on immense ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... the abettors of prelacy, sensible of his great abilities, were earnestly desirous to bring him over to their side at his death[65], and for that purpose palmed upon the world most groundless stories of his changing his principles at his last hours; yea, the anonymous author of the civil wars of Great Britain goes farther, when he says, page 200. "Mr. Henderson had the honour to be converted by his majesty's discourse ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie |
