"Invidious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... young Gentlemen, The whole System of an English Education; they had not incurr'd those Self-contradictions of which they are guilty; they had not mention'd your self, and your incomparable Treasury of Northern Literature in so cold and negligent a manner, as betrays too much of an invidious Pedantry: But in those Terms of Veneration and Applause which are your just Tribute, not only from the Learned of your own Countrey, but of most of the other Northern Nations, whether more or less Polite: Who would ...
— An Apology For The Study of Northern Antiquities • Elizabeth Elstob
... where so many great masters have gone before me, I felt less diffidence in attempting the lower and more colloquial form of the measure, as not requiring the same command of rhythm, and not exposing a writer to the same amount of invidious ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... stated, not in an invidious spirit towards the French, but because there is no example on record, which furnishes such a comparison between the safety which depends on cool and orderly behaviour in the season of peril, and the terrible catastrophe which ...
— Narratives of Shipwrecks of the Royal Navy; between 1793 and 1849 • William O. S. Gilly
... contemptuous and spendthrift landlord class, who considered the tenant in no other light than as a rent-paying creature. As Roman Catholics they found themselves the social inferiors of the ruling Protestant class—the laws had placed them in that invidious position. They were practically without any defence. They were ignorant, poor, and half-starved. Thriftless, like their landlords, they ate up in the autumn what harvests they gathered, and begged for their winter's support. Adultery and incest were common ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... connected with the Tenth Virginia Cavalry, under Colonel J. Lucius Davis, and, therefore, better cognizant of its conduct, it is not invidious to allude to it, though not claiming any superiority over other regiments, all of which did nobly. Early in the morning this regiment was dismounted for sharp-shooting, and, until ordered off, held its ground, though exposed to ...
— Three Years in the Federal Cavalry • Willard Glazier
... distinguished, in order to an accurate discussion of this question, as it relates to persons or to things. To think highly of ourselves in comparison with others, to assume by our own authority that precedence which none is willing to grant, must be always invidious and offensive; but to rate our powers high in proportion to things, and imagine ourselves equal to great undertakings, while we leave others in possession of the same abilities, cannot ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... that the correspondence should have ended where it did; for the penetration of that man would have perceived, at the first glance, that nothing was to be drawn from that mode of attack. In what form the next invidious attempts may appear, ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... lived in the days when the knight had 'Une seule' embroidered on his banner. I'll never believe that his loves were so limited; doubtless each appropriated the invidious distinction ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... allow me to attest the accuracy of its historical statements, indorse the sentiments it expresses, and thank you in the nation's name for the sure promise it gives. Nobly sustained, as the Government has been, by all the churches, I would utter nothing which might in the least appear invidious against any. Yet without this, it may fairly be said, that the Methodist Episcopal Church, not less devoted than the best, is by its greatest numbers the most important of all. It is no fault in others that the Methodist Church sends ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... military positions, to take certain oaths, and partake of the communion according to the rites of the Anglican Church. It is true that these laws were not now strictly enforced; nevertheless, the laws were invidious and vexatious, and the Protestant dissenters demanded their repeal. The result of the debate in Parliament was the repeal of such parts of the ancient acts as it was necessary to rescind in order ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... can be hoisted, to run from out of thy violent abuse, O woman. But I, since thou thus much vauntest thy favors, think that Venus alone both of Gods and men was the protectress of my voyage. But thou hast a fickle mind, but it is an invidious account to go through, how love compelled thee with his inevitable arrows to preserve my life. But I will not follow up arguments with too great accuracy, for where thou hast assisted me it is well. Moreover thou hast ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... deal has been said about prose poetry. As a rule, it is very poor stuff. As prose it has a tendency to run into blank verse; as poetry it is highly rhetorical and self-conscious. It would be invidious and might be irritating to select examples from modern masters of prose- poetry. They have never been poets. But the prose of a poet like Milton may be, and is, poetical in the true sense; and so, upon occasions, was the prose of Thackeray. Some examples linger always ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang
... invidious to call to account men of learning, who have gone before me in inquiries of this nature, and to point out defects in their writings: but it is a task which I must, in some degree, take in hand, as the best writers have, in my opinion, failed ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant
... fully represented in the tales before us. Wonder and reverence, are not these the parents of Romance? Intelligent curiosity and intellectual doubt—those are what the Renaissance brought. Without indulging in invidious comparisons between the relative value of these gifts, I would turn back to our stories with the remark that much of the wonder which they exhibit is due to the vague localisation which runs through them. Rome, Paris, Byzantium, form spots of light on the mediaeval map, but ...
— Old French Romances • William Morris
... fast, with a laugh, and crimsoned all over. She knew perfectly well what he was about. He was determined to perform all that could possibly be required of him. He would put down invidious comments, disarm gossip, in short cut off the gorgon's head at the first struggle. They might term it unnatural, overdone, but at least it would not be to do again; and Harry Jardine's was the temper, that, if you presented an obstacle to it, it itched the more ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... less than first honours. What are the natural or acquired endowments of Kemble or Cooke, whether mental or corporeal? Certainly not superior to those of Mr. Cooper. How do they respectively stand in the records of professional fame? It would be invidious to ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol. I. No. 3. March 1810 • Various
... calculated to introduce "weakness, disorder, and insincerity into every branch of political business;" to "separate the Court from the State;" to "disconnect the authority to command service from the power of animating it by reward;" and to impose on the Regent "all the invidious duties of the kingly station, without the means of softening them to the public by any one act of ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... London, in order to fix a date correctly; which, when I had accomplished, I well knew would obtain me no praise, though a failure would have been to my discredit. And after all, perhaps, hard as it may be, I shall not be surprized if omissions or mistakes be pointed out with invidious severity. I have also been extremely careful as to the exactness of my quotations; holding that there is a respect due to the publick which should oblige every Authour to attend to this, and never to presume to introduce them with,—'I think I have read;'—or,—'If I remember right;'—when ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... oil. Perhaps a very brief account, in conclusion, of the methods of procedure in these examinations may interest the reader; and in case he should think that my object in offering my sketch is to draw an invidious comparison between the English and American methods of examination, I refer him to an animated and interesting correspondence in the April issue of the Nation between President Eliot of Harvard and Professor Adams of Michigan University—a discussion ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... received a reply from Spain, to the earnest representations made by him, in the preceding autumn, of the distracted state of the colony and the outrages of these lawless men, and his prayers for royal countenance and support. The letter was written by his invidious enemy, the Bishop Fonseca, superintendent of Indian affairs. It acknowledged the receipt of his statement of the alleged insurrection of Roldan, but observed that this matter must be suffered to ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... Association. Beginning with the opening sermon of Dr. Meredith, and closing with the address of Dr. Taylor, all the reports and addresses were thoughtful and pertinent. Some of the papers on special topics were of a very high order, and it may not be invidious to name the remarkable paper by Colonel Keating, of Memphis, Tenn., which places him alongside of Drs. Curry and Haygood among the leaders of thought in ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 12, December, 1889 • Various
... it will be remembered, was Earl of Ulster in right of his wife, Isabella, was now appointed Viceroy. He landed in Dublin, on the 15th September, 1360, with an army of one thousand men. From the first moment of his arrival he exercised the most bitter hostility to the Irish, and enhanced the invidious distinction between the English by birth and the English by descent. Long before his arrival, the "mere Irishman" was excluded from the offices of mayor, bailiff, or officer in any town within the English ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... new phase of the conflict was opened by the negotiation of two further Commercial Treaties with Switzerland—one by Great Britain and the other by the United States—in both of which the invidious reservations, substantially as in the French Treaty of 1827, were retained.[73] Some mystery attaches to the circumstances in which these treaties were signed and ratified,[74] but the probable explanation is that the Swiss negotiators promised in effect that there ...
— Notes on the Diplomatic History of the Jewish Question • Lucien Wolf
... ringing with my praise. Nay, if you ever thought that I shewed courage in political business, you certainly would have admired my conduct in that cause. For when the culprit had betaken himself to public meetings, and had made an invidious use of my name, immortal gods! What battles! What havoc! What sallies I made upon Piso, Curio, on the whole of that set! How I fell upon the old men for their instability, on the young for their profligacy! Again and again, so help me heaven! I regretted your absence not only as the supporter ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... sunk away, and its glow behind the waters had faded to the merest tinge. In the cold shadow of rising night the two men advanced silently homewards. Sir Adrian's soul, guided by the invidious words, had flown back to that dead year, the central point of his existence—It was true: men will be men—in that very house, yonder, he had betrayed his love to her; on board the ship that took them away and by the camp fire on the eve of fight, he had pleaded the ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... more vigorously, that we could not resist their entreaties. The flesh, the skins, and even the contents of the stomachs of the deer were equally distributed among the party by Mr. Hood, who had volunteered, on the departure of Mr. Wentzel, to perform the duty of issuing the provision. This invidious task he had all along performed with great impartiality, but seldom without producing some grumbling amongst the Canadians; and, on the present occasion, the hunters were displeased that the heads and some other parts, had ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin
... be invidious to single out one for special mention from the great army of brave men who have upheld the traditions of the Empire on the field of battle. Without mentioning the name of the hero the following incident is cited as illustrative of many which ...
— Over the Top With the Third Australian Division • G. P. Cuttriss
... these revenue adventures did the Laird of Ellangowan seriously incline, and the amusement which he derived from Kennedy's society formed an excellent reason for countenancing and assisting the narrator in the execution of his invidious and hazardous duty. ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... not mentioned the difference between these two eminent persons, with a view of drawing any invidious comparisons, but because, as these statements are true, such persons as have a high opinion of the late Mr. Pitt's judgment, may see that this great man did not espouse the cause hastily, or merely as a matter of feeling, but upon the conviction of ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... Leblanc received this proposal with a modest confusion that greatly enhanced the king's opinion of his admirable simplicity. He pointed out that eager as he was to snatch at the proffered distinction, it might at the present stage appear invidious, and he therefore suggested that the conferring of it should be postponed until it could be made the crown and conclusion of his services. The king was unable to shake this resolution, and the two men parted with ...
— The World Set Free • Herbert George Wells
... we may talk of democracy in Australia, we are far from realizing a truly democratic ideal. A State in a pure democracy draws no nice and invidious distinctions between man and man. She disclaims the right of favouring either property, education, talent, or virtue. She conceives that all alike have an interest in good government, and that all who ...
— An Autobiography • Catherine Helen Spence
... subject will completely satisfy. We are more anxious for late information than for accurate information. We have an almost unconquerable feeling that if it is late it must be accurate. All of us are sensitive to being thought behind the times. We feel that no stigma can be more invidious in the intellectual world than the stigma of being out of date. This pervades the masses quite as strongly as it does the more cultured classes. Under these conditions everybody wants to know the latest theory that science has to offer concerning anything that can be brought within ...
— The Meaning of Evolution • Samuel Christian Schmucker
... you can, every man's being fit for his business in life, you put education as a bar, or condition, between him and what he aims at. The principle is just as good for one class as another, and it is only by applying it impartially that you save its application from being insolent and invidious.... You propose to make old Diggs' boys instruct themselves before they go bird-scaring or sheep-tending. I want to know what you do to make those three worthies in that justice-room instruct themselves before they may go acting ...
— Matthew Arnold • G. W. E. Russell
... view of the universe. It is difficult to express one's relation to them; the whole Venetian art-world is so near, so familiar, so much an extension and adjunct of the spreading actual, that it seems almost invidious to say one owes more to one of them than to the other. Nowhere, not even in Holland, where the correspondence between the real aspects and the little polished canvases is so constant and so exquisite, do art and life seem so interfused and, as it were, ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... (for, by a law which he preferred for the purpose, he procured the recall of Popillius, who had been exiled by the influence of Caius Gracchus) was a man of spirit, and a tolerable Speaker: but he did not finish his Consulship so happily. For, in consequence of the invidious law of Mamilius above-mentioned, C. Galba one of the Priests, and the four Consular gentlemen L. Bestia, C. Cato, Sp. Albinus, and that excellent citizen L. Opimius, who killed Gracchus; of which he was acquitted by the people, though he had constantly sided against them,—were ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... lamented this error, and attempts have been made, hitherto without success, to apply the amendatory power of the States to its correction. As, however, one mode of correction is in the power of every President, and consequently in mine, it would be useless, and perhaps invidious, to enumerate the evils of which, in the opinion of many of our fellow-citizens, this error of the sages who framed the Constitution may have been the source and the bitter fruits which we are still to gather from it if it continues ...
— Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Harrison • James D. Richardson
... conferences between the two houses, and at length the bill passed by their mutual assent. Lord Haversham moved for an inquiry into the miscarriages of the last campaign, hoping to find some foundation for censure in the conduct of the duke of Marlborough; but the proposal was rejected as invidious; and the two houses presented an address to the queen, desiring she would preserve a good correspondence among all the confederates. They likewise concurred in repealing the act by which the Scots had been alienated, and all the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... the Belgian, and the German, whose hotels and restaurants are, first of all, for quiet, ordinary guests, and only secondarily as places where liquid refreshment—alcoholic or otherwise—is served with equal alacrity, but without invidious distinction. ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield
... respecting others, and the closest inquisition about ourselves; and the wisest and best men, from well-grounded fears of their own perseverance in well-doing, have declined[1] all superior affectation of sanctity or invidious comparison of the behaviour of others with their own, lest they should afterwards fall into some grievous sin, and thus bring disgrace on religion and virtue. The Catholic church, he said, was a term implying affectionate communion as well as universality; and how could they be ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... invidious bar, 5 And grasps the skirts of happy chance, And breasts the blows of circumstance, And grapples with his ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson
... follower of the Chutsz philosophy. This bigoted measure, spoken of as the "prohibition of heterodoxy," did not produce the desired effect. It tended rather to accentuate the differences between the various schools, and a petition was presented to the Bakufu urging that the invidious veto should be rescinded. The petitioners contended that although the schools differed from each other, their differences were not material, since all stood on common foundations, namely, the doctrines of Confucius and Mencius, and all agreed in inculcating the ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... without any political wash to clear him. Instances are not lacking of titled adventurers ostracized in Winnipeg and Montreal going to Newport and capturing the richest heiresses of the land. These instances are not mentioned in invidious self-righteousness. They are mentioned purely to illustrate the underlying, unspoken ...
— The Canadian Commonwealth • Agnes C. Laut
... the whole.—Those principles, however, I conceive should equally apply to all the active citizens, within the age prescribed by law.—All are deeply interested in the general security; and where there are no invidious exemptions, partial distinctions or privileged bands, every Man, it is presumed, would pride himself in the right of bearing arms, and affording his personal appearance in common with his fellow-citizens. If upon examination you shall find, that the duties incident to our present ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... Invidious barrier! why art thou so high, When the slight covering of her neck slips by, There half revealing to the eager sight Her full, ripe bosom, exquisitely white? In many a local tale of harmless mirth, And many a jest of momentary birth, She ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield
... actors in the political play. I have buried professional politicians, and the most of them made a very bad funeral for a Christian minister to speak at. I always wanted, at such a time, an Episcopal prayer book, which is made for all eases, and may not be taken either as invidious ...
— T. De Witt Talmage - As I Knew Him • T. De Witt Talmage
... the principal place in the confidence of the king is a doctrine which was not established until the first administration of the younger Pitt; and though the title of prime minister had come into use by 1760, it was still regarded as invidious by constitutional purists. According to George's system he was himself to be the only element of coherence in a ministry; it was to be formed by the prime minister in accordance with his instructions, ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... intrinsic Merit. The principal Satrap proclaim'd, with an audible Voice, such Actions as would entitle the Victor to the inestimable Prize; but never mention'd one Word of Zadig's Greatness of Soul, in returning his invidious Neighbour all his Estate, notwithstanding he would have taken away his Life: That was but a Trifle, ...
— Zadig - Or, The Book of Fate • Voltaire
... long practice, it hath been established, that realms and principalities may descend to females by hereditary right, it did not appear to me necessary to move the question, not only because the thing would be most invidious; but because in my opinion it would not be lawful to unsettle governments which are ordained by the ...
— The First Blast of the Trumpet against the monstrous regiment - of Women • John Knox
... lived upon the hope to meet with the lost again. At last, and most recently, it was my fate to discover that the object of this unconquerable affection lived,—was still free in hand if not in heart: you behold the lover of your mother in Ernest Maltravers! It devolved on me (an invidious—a reluctant duty) to inform Maltravers of the identity of Lady Vargrave with the Alice of his boyish passion; to prove to him her suffering, patient, unsubdued affection; to convince him that the sole hope left to ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... passed under the speare, and heartily it grieved me to behold its limbs, like those of the chaste Hippolytus, separated and torn from that so well chosen and compacted a body. The Earl of Anglesey's, and several others since, by I know not what invidious fate, passed the same fortune, to whatever influence and constellation now reigning malevolent to books and libraries, which can portend no good to the ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts
... and Mr. Fairfax went on meeting in society; and Daniel Granger, with whom it was a kind of habit to ask men to dinner, could hardly avoid inviting George Fairfax. It might have seemed invidious to do so; and for what reason should he make such a distinction? Even to himself Mr. Granger would not be willing to confess that he was jealous of this man. So Mr. Fairfax came with others of his species to the gorgeous caravanserai in the Rue de Morny, where ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... is, that their dress should be under your regulation, not under that of the law; and it ought to be your wish to hold them in control and guardianship, not in bondage; and to prefer the title of father or husband to that of master. The consul just now made use of some invidious terms, calling it a female sedition and secession; because, I suppose, there is danger of their seizing the sacred mount, as formerly the angry plebeians did; or the Aventine. Their feeble nature must submit to whatever you think proper to enjoin; ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... spectacle to see the survival of the fittest squadrons of the Scarlet Lancers filing past. There are half a dozen Cavalry Regiments against whom no one could throw a stone—the 9th and 16th Lancers are of these. But it would be invidious ...
— On the Heels of De Wet • The Intelligence Officer
... shone in upon his mind. For here was a coveted privilege of the White People from which he was debarred, he and the bheestie and the Sepoy. They were all one, he thought bitterly, to the White People. The invidious bar of his colour ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason
... admitted. Hence have many free states, by departing from this rule, been endangered by the revolt of their slaves; while in absolute and despotic governments, where no real liberty exists, and consequently no invidious comparisons can be formed, such incidents are extremely rare. Two precautions are therefore advised to be observed in all prudent and free governments: 1. To prevent the introduction of slavery at all; or, 2. If it be already ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IV (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland II • Various
... a tranquil people who pass their days as do those who now live in the "Valley of the Three Forks o' the Wolf." They are free from invidious jealousies and the blight of avarice toward each other, free from doubt of the rectitude of their daughters and relieved from solicitude that the future of their sons, if they remain in the valley, will be influenced by dissipation or dishonesty—a ...
— Sergeant York And His People • Sam Cowan
... use of it. And the heroic Christ and his heroic Christianity will draw every heroic soul in the community to himself. They may not be very heroic looking. You may be in some hill town in old Massachusetts "Nurse of heroes." Pardon me, I do not intend to be invidious. Heroism is cosmopolitan. One of the pillars of your church may be the school-teacher of the little red school-house at the fork of the roads, in the yard ornamented with alders, mulleins, and sumachs. She boards around, ...
— The Whence and the Whither of Man • John Mason Tyler
... how that may be; but the mechanism employed is something very different from any that the author of Rasselas was in the habit of bringing to bear on such occasions. There is nothing more futile, as well as invidious, than this mode of criticising a work of original genius. Its greatest merit is supposed to be in the invention; and you say, very wisely, that it is not in the execution. You might as well take away the merit ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... is too diffuse for a mere note: and during the life-time of so many able printers as now exercise their calling in the metropolis, it would be invidious to particularize eminence in our profession (whereas among our immediate predecessors it is, perhaps just to say that there were only two printers of great celebrity, the late Mr. Bulmer and my late father). ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... eyes",—superb admonitions both, each containing such felicities of grave, compacted statement as will hardly be surpassed. The assuaging, marmoreal majesty of the concluding lines of the poem are a final demonstration of the virtue of this formal dignity in poetry. If it did not appear invidious, one would like to quote by way of contrast some lines oddly parallel, but on a pitch deliberately subdued to a less rhetorical level, from what is indubitably one of the very greatest poems written in our own century, Mr. ...
— The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749) and Two Rambler papers (1750) • Samuel Johnson
... in making the comparison between the two services is not to gratify an invidious feeling. More expensive as living in America certainly is, still the disproportion is such as must create surprise; and if it requires such a sum for an American officer to support himself in a creditable and gentlemanlike manner, what can be expected from the English officer with his miserable ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... can remember that I have made invidious remarks about New York, and have objected to the odors in Chicago, and have hated the Illinois Central turnstiles. But if I could be back in America I would not mind being caught in a turnstile all day. Dear America! Dear Lake Michigan! ...
— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell
... of this ignorance will hardly be denied, and it would be invidious to produce examples of them from writings of the present day. But there can be nothing ungenerous in referring—honoris, not invidiae causa—to one of the very best literary histories of this or any century, Mr Ticknor's Spanish ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... of those immense bales of paper which must needs have been employed in such numbers of books? Can these also be wholly annihilated, and to of a sudden, as I pretend? What shall I say in return of so invidious an objection? It ill befits the distance between your Highness and me to send you for ocular conviction to a jakes or an oven, to the windows of a bawdyhouse, or to a sordid lanthorn. Books, like men their authors, have ...
— A Tale of a Tub • Jonathan Swift
... brilliant, still landscape. The wide concave which lay at the back of the hill in this direction was blazing with the western light, adding an orange tint to the vivid purple of the heather, now at the very climax of bloom, and free from the slightest touch of the invidious brown that so soon creeps into its shades. The light so intensified the colours that they seemed to stand above the surface of the earth and float in mid-air like an exhalation of red. In the minor valleys, between the hillocks and ridges which diversified the contour ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... moved in the House of Commons that Pitt should be honoured with a public funeral and a monument. The motion was opposed by Fox in a speech which deserves to be studied as a model of good taste and good feeling. The task was the most invidious that ever an orator undertook: but it was performed with a humanity and delicacy which were warmly acknowledged by the mourning friends of him who was gone. The motion was carried by 288 ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 3. (of 4) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... a kindred question not without interest. The mind naturally flies to the triumphs of the Hellenic and Elizabethan theatre in exhibiting scenes laid "far in the Unapparent," and asks why they should not be repeated. But the meditative world is older, more invidious, more nervous, more quizzical, than it once was, and being unhappily ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... bird, he suffered it to remain there. Together they walked to the nearest corner, and stood awaiting the coming of a trolley-car, the heat of an August sun blazing upon them, the stifling odors of the tenement quarter filling their nostrils. Rude, half-naked little boys jeered at them, and made invidious remarks about Ivan's new clothes; a small girl smiled shyly at him; a wretched yellow dog snapped at his heels. To these varying attentions the child gave the same quietly observant glance, a glance without rancor as without interest. Miss Clarkson ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... the case: 'I felt as anybody naturally would have, you know, that my words on your choice the other day were invidious and unfair, and thought an apology ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... said, incisively biting off his words, "if you told me anything of the kind I should say that you are what posterity will probably call a nature faker, and one of a perniciously invidious sort." ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs
... zaptieh. As long as his horse was fresh, or until we were out of sight of the village, he would urge us on with cries of "Gellcha-buk" ("Come on, ride fast"). When a bad piece of road or a steep ascent forced us to dismount he would bring his horse to a walk, roll a cigarette, and draw invidious comparisons between our steeds. His tone, however, changed when we reached a decline or long stretch of reasonably good road. Then he would cut across country to head us off, or shout after us at the top of his voice, "Yavash-yavash" ("Slowly, slowly"). On the ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... contempt, destroy or lessen the circulation of his books, and, in general, to blacken and break down his literary reputation by any and every means, even to the extent of aspersing his personal reputation, although there had never been the slightest personal collision. Its bitter and invidious spirit was not in the least disguised by a few exaggerated compliments adroitly inserted here and there: these merely furnish the foil needed to give greater potency and efficiency to the personal insinuations, and, like Mark ...
— A Public Appeal for Redress to the Corporation and Overseers of Harvard University - Professor Royce's Libel • Francis Ellingwood Abbot
... carriages and clatter of hoofs coming to a standstill before the Institute. Never, perhaps, had so many people in evening costume gathered under this roof. Even Mr. Chown, the draper, though scornful of such fopperies, had thought it due to his position as a town-councillor to don the invidious garb; he was not disposed to herd among the undistinguished at the back of the room. Ladies were in great force, though many of them sought places with an abashed movement, not quite sure whether what they were about to hear ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... from other lands were also refused domicile here if imported under contract, [Footnote: Law of February 26, 1885] or unable to support themselves. The stronger law against the Chinese at first sight seemed invidious, but there was some justification for it in the fact that those people almost never settled down permanently as citizens of the United States, but returned to their native land so soon as they earned a competence. Italians of the lowest class did this to some extent, but the great bulk of ...
— History of the United States, Volume 4 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... "It may appear invidious in me, Miss Psyche Zenobia, to refer you to any article, or set of articles, in the way of model or study, yet perhaps I may as well call your attention to a few cases. Let me see. There was 'The Dead Alive,' a capital ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 4 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... concerning the abuse of authority is just, but in this case it is altogether inapplicable; because the complaint was not of the abuse, but of the use of authority in matters of trade, which ought to have been free. He throws out a variety of invidious reflections against the Council, as if they wanted zeal for the Company's service; his justification of his practices, and his declaration of his resolution to persevere in them, are firm and determined,—asserting ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... large number of the ladies of New York city who distinguished themselves for their devotion to the welfare of the soldiers of our army, of whom so many in all forms of suffering were brought there during the war, it seems almost invidious to select any individual. But it is perhaps less so in the case of the subject of this sketch, than of many others, since from the very beginning of the war till long after its close, she quietly sacrificed the ease and luxury of her life to devote herself untiringly, and ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... asked leave to speak, upon which almost all the members present left the building. On this side, no doubt part of the antipathy arose from the popular feeling against Cavour's father, who still occupied the invidious and ill-defined office of Vicario. No particular ferocity was laid at his door, but he was supposed to serve up all the private affairs of the good Turinese to the king, and if any one got into trouble he ...
— Cavour • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... a perpetual Terror into the Besiegers. Nor did he only this way annoy the Enemy; the Precautions he had us'd, and the Measures he had taken in other Places, with a View to prevent their Return to Madrid, though the Invidious endeavour'd to bury them in Oblivion, having equally contributed to the driving of the Mareschal of France, and his Catholick King, out ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... church. He seemed full of calm piety, and said he always felt the most delightful sensations in a Sunday church-yard,—that it struck him as if God had given to man fifty-two springs in every year. After the service, he was vehement against the sermon, as common-place, and invidious in its tone towards the poor. Then he gave many texts from the lessons and gospel of the day, as affording fit subjects for discourses. He ridiculed the absurdity of refusing to believe every thing that you could not understand; and mentioned a rebuke of Dr. Parr's ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge
... himself. In a like spirit it may be remarked, that it ought not to be permitted to inferior writers to monopolize all the appliances and means of popularity that art can bestow. Accordingly, the proprietors have secured the hearty and zealous co-operation of Kenny Meadows. It would be invidious, and from the purpose, to institute a comparison between this gentleman and his contemporaries; but it may be asserted that no living artist has shown an equal versatility of genius, which points him out as the man best fitted to trace the many-colored ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... Martin's accusations was drawn up in the most minute manner, replying to every charge seriatim, and bringing to light a multitude of nefarious practices on the part of his Government, which had been previously kept back. Lest I might appear in the invidious light of an accuser, I was strongly dissuaded from its publication, as being unnecessary, the Chilian Government paying no attention whatever to his charges, but being afraid of embroiling themselves ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... to the President to save him the invidious task of selection among the vast number of worthy applicants, and have ordered my army commanders to prepare their lists with great care, and to express their preferences, based upon claims of ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... play with our ingenuous feelings; and thus is an importance given to the established Church in the concords of man's nervous system, which renders it unnecessary for its priesthood to be jealous or invidious towards those who dissent from its doctrines for conscience sake. In truth, such is the imposing attitude of the national Church, that, if the members leave the Church to sit under strange pulpits, the incumbent should suspect his doctrines, his zeal, his talents, or his ...
— A Morning's Walk from London to Kew • Richard Phillips
... with Professor Ladd, "that the reference to Jonah does not cover the question whether the prophet's alleged sojourn in the sea monster is an historical verity; and that it is no less uncritical than invidious to make the holding of any particular theory of the Book of Jonah a test of allegiance to the teachings of the Master." [Footnote: The Doctrine of Sacred Scripture, ...
— Who Wrote the Bible? • Washington Gladden
... by the French Canadians towards the English when the yoke of early conquest yet hung heavily on them, this feeling eventually died away under the mild influence of a government that preserved to them the exercise of all their customary privileges, and abolished all invidious distinctions between the descendants of France and those of the mother-country. So universally, too, has this system of conciliation been pursued, we believe we may with safety aver, of all the numerous colonies that have succumbed to the genius and ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... that the whole truth of the matter might not be published till at any rate the girl had been in her grave for a few days, when the interposing barriers of earth and time, and a sense that the events had been somewhat shut into oblivion, would deaden the sting that revelation and invidious remark would have ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... state in 1785 where the Loyalist was allowed to vote. In New York Loyalist lawyers were not allowed to practise until April 1786, and then only on condition of taking an 'oath of abjuration and allegiance.' In the same state, Loyalists were subjected to such invidious special taxation that in 1785 one of them confessed that 'those in New York whose estates have not been confiscated are so loaded with taxes and other grievances that there is nothing left but to sell out and move into the protection of the ...
— The United Empire Loyalists - A Chronicle of the Great Migration - Volume 13 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • W. Stewart Wallace
... Lord Rhondda, who achieved success in the most irksome and invidious of offices. He undertook the duties of Food Controller in broken health, never spared himself, and died in harness. It is to be hoped that he realised what was the truth—that he had won not only the confidence but the ...
— Mr. Punch's History of the Great War • Punch
... the reader, if a student or a graduate, has only to recall to mind the instances that he himself must have observed of discontent and disorder growing out of trifling causes and culminating perhaps in a "class-strike." Let him consider the waste of time, the ill-temper, the censorious, invidious spirit engendered by this fermentation, the loss of faith in the conduct, and even the honesty, of the faculty. Can he conceive of anything more likely to frustrate all the aims of college study? Yet in nine-tenths ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... family to support has been taken as a basis of assessment. Any other conclusion would prejudice the married man in search of employment and would tend to produce sterility of the population, and would place the industrial court in the invidious position of fixing wages at a rate which would make it difficult, if not impossible, for single men to save something for the time when they may have the felicity to become supporters of a family."[121] The argument in support of the suggested basis of assessment for women ...
— The Settlement of Wage Disputes • Herbert Feis
... missionaries in their houses, as many have found to their cost; and the fact cannot be concealed that the foreign community in China suffers no small inconvenience and incurs considerable danger for a cause with which a large majority of its members has no sympathy whatever. It would, however, be invidious to dwell upon the class of natives who allow themselves to be baptized and pretend to accept dogmas they most certainly do not understand, or on the mental and social calibre of numbers of those gentlemen who are sent out to convert them; we will confine ourselves merely to considering what practical ...
— Chinese Sketches • Herbert A. Giles
... most admirable symmetry he had ever beheld; and though her countenance was concealed by a thick veil, in accordance with the custom of the East, yet he seemed to have been impressed with an instinctive conviction that the face beneath that invidious covering was eminently beautiful. Moreover, the eyes whose glances flashed through the two holes which were formed in the veil so as to permit the enjoyment of the faculty of sight, were gloriously brilliant, yet black as jet. Once, too, when the lady raised ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... clearly explains as meaning that through the death and resurrection of Christ "the middle wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles was broken down" and a universal religion inaugurated, free from all invidious distinctions and carnal ordinances. In his bodily death and spiritual ascension the Jewish ritual law was abolished and the world wide moral law alone installed. From his spirit, rising into heaven, all national peculiarities fell away, ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... of every citizen. Woman can never have an equal chance with man in the struggle of life until she too wields this power. So long as women have no voice in the Government under which they live they will be an ostracised class, and invidious distinctions will be made against them in the world of work. Thrown on their own resources they have all the hardships that men have to encounter in earning their daily bread, with the added disabilities which grow out of disfranchisement. Men of the republic, why make life harder for ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... with much Freedom, but no manner of Malice, remark an Instance or two, from no mean Writers, to prove, that our Poetry has been degenerating apace into mere Sound, or Harmony; nor ought This to be consider'd as an invidious Attempt, since whatever Pains we take, about polishing our Numbers, where we raise not our Meaning, are as impertinently bestowed, as the Labour wou'd be, of setting a broken Leg after the Soul has left the Body. The Gunners have a Custom, when a Ball is too little for the Bore of their ...
— 'Of Genius', in The Occasional Paper, and Preface to The Creation • Aaron Hill
... private confessions of particular ladies to their husbands; for as their children were born in wedlock, and of consequence are legitimate, it would be an invidious task to record them as bastards; and particularly after their several husbands have so ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift
... Instances were brought up,—declared by these friends to be innumerable, but which did, in truth, amount to three or four,—of English gentlemen who had come home from a former Carlist war, bearing the title of colonel, without any contradiction or invidious remark. Had this gallant officer appeared as Colonel Tifto, perhaps less might have been said about it. There was a little lack of courage in the title which he did choose. But it was accepted at last, ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... mortification of spirit, or from that strange shrewd ness which belonged to him—would remark that Mrs. Rollick was of a querulous nature; that the compliment was meant, not to please my mother, but to spite the professed cook and housekeeper, to whom the butler would be sure to repeat the invidious apology. ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of confused papers, we inevitably, we even at last sociably conversed. I saw things weren't well with him, but I asked no question till something dropped by himself made, as it had made on another occasion, an absence of curiosity invidious. He mentioned that he was worried about his good old friend Lady Coxon, who, with her niece likely to be detained some time in America, lay seriously ill at Clockborough, much on his ...
— The Coxon Fund • Henry James
... have said thus much merely to explain their motives, and to smooth their way to the discharge of a task, in the performance of which they will necessarily be exposed to many invidious remarks from the misconceptions of presumptuous ignorance. Having done so they fearlessly commit the subject to the public judgment, and proceed to the execution of ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter
... Both arrived about the same time at the market-place; but Mr. Darnel, mounting first into the balcony of the town-house, made a long speech to the people in favour of his own pretensions, not without some invidious reflections glanced at Sir ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... say what I suffered; better judges of literature than myself admire them still, I know. I will only remark that I don't admire them. I don't say they are the dullest novels ever printed, because that would be invidious, and might do wrong to works of even greater pretensions; but to ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... even the adamantine surface of the Captain's tranquil temper. There was a homoeopathic admixture of this jealous poison in all the food he ate. He could rarely get through a tete-a-tete breakfast or dinner undisturbed by some invidious remark. ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon
... art to exalt the mind by exciting the feelings as well as the judgment; and the immortal lessons of Plutarch would never have awakened the first stirrings of ambition in the innumerable great men who date their career from reading his pages, had he been actuated by the minute and invidious spirit of modern biography. These reflections have occurred the more forcibly at this juncture, as the subject of this narrative was on the point of leaving a country in which were men destined to acquire glory in such achievements as Plutarch would ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... have ignominiously failed; when the plain truth is, that if they succeeded in taking the glamour for those heroes of whom they write, they have hurt mankind so far, and have impoverished imagination and endeavor by their invidious task. We need not suppose Christopher Columbus and Washington saints, seeing there is no inclination to canonize them; but we need not hold their follies up to wake the guffaw of a crowd. Such laughter ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle
... her beautiful eyes, and they were tears not only of tenderness but gratitude. Fortunately Lord de Mowbray was at the moment absent, and as the question of the controverted inheritance was a secret to every member of the family except himself, the name of Gerard excited no invidious sensation in the circle. Sybil was willing to please and to be pleased: every one was captivated by her beauty, her grace, her picturesque expression and sweet simplicity. Lady de Mowbray serenely smiled ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... through which I have had the privilege of conducting my readers does not exercise any invidious separation between the two. I have read a good many French novels—hundreds certainly, I do not know that it would be preposterous to say thousands—that I have not even mentioned in this book.[566] ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... to institute any invidious comparisons between Old Britain and Young America. We are one people—one in blood, one literature, one faith, one religion, in fact or in profession. Our language girdles the whole earth. Our science and our religion more or less enlighten ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... loneliness had worn off in their gregarious gathering at a London hotel they were not likely to consort with their own country people, who indeed were apt to fight shy of one another, and even to indulge in invidious criticism of one another when admitted in that society to which they were all equally strangers. So he took leave of them on their way back to London with the belief that their acquaintance terminated with that brief ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... York itself does not present a higher average of female beauty than Chicago, and that is saying a great deal. But I must not enlarge on this fascinating topic. A Judgment of Paris is always a delicate business, and I am in nowise called upon to make the invidious award. Were I compelled to undertake it, I could only distribute the apple, and my homage, in equal shares to the goddesses of the East, the ...
— America To-day, Observations and Reflections • William Archer
... his birth's invidious bar, And grasps the skirts of happy chance, And breasts the blows of circumstance, And grapples with ...
— The Ontario Readers: Fourth Book • Various
... general, deeming the kind of usage which Mackra had received, inconsistent with piratical policy, they circulated a report, that he was coming against them with the Company's force. The result of these invidious reports was to deprive England of his command, and to excite these cruel villains to put him on shore, with three others, upon the island of Mauritius. If England and his small company had not been destitute of every ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... within certain prescribed limits, or hold him in that marked estimation of inferiority which makes him forever conscious of his own degradation. I have felt justified, therefore, not by way of opprobrium, nor in the spirit of invidious or odious comparison, to name the category in which he belongs, and then, by fair moral and philosophical argument to deduce the justice and right of civilization in holding dominion ...
— The Right of American Slavery • True Worthy Hoit
... request involves a departure from your general disposition of the periodical addresses of your members, but we beg to suggest that the general interest of the present production renders a departure from your usual course not invidious, but a duty which we humbly think you owe to philanthropy. In support of our opinion, we take the liberty of enclosing you a letter from a distinguished fellow-citizen in Albany, who also accidentally saw the ...
— A Dissertation on the Medical Properties and Injurious Effects of the Habitual Use of Tobacco • A. McAllister
... Anne in vain sought to excuse herself from an honour at once arrogant and invidious, though too innocent to perceive the cunning so characteristic of the queen; for, under the guise of a special compliment, Anne had received the royal request to have her female attendants chosen from the court, and Elizabeth now desired to force upon her a selection which could not fail to mortify ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... now understand, that over and above the passive and less invidious mode of discountenancing or forbearing to countenance a presentee, by withdrawing from the direct "call" upon him, usage has sanctioned another and stronger sort of protest; one which takes the shape of distinct ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... liked to decline this rather invidious office, especially as she felt no compromise to be possible; but he was so urgent that she finally agreed to go ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... the castellations. But what was the most vivid mark of the brothers, and vividest on the part of the supersubtle Louis, was his French treatment of certain of our native local names, Ohio and Iowa for instance, which he rendered, as to their separate vowels, with a daintiness and a delicacy invidious and imperturbable, so that he might have been Chateaubriand declaiming Les Natchez at Madame Recamier's—O-ee-oh and Ee-o-wah; a proceeding in him, a violence offered to his serried circle of little staring and glaring New Yorkers supplied with the usual ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James
... actual, achieved end. One misses the heated passion of Watts's best pictures, which flow through the ordered channel of recognisable expression and make one adore them as poetry. But there, of a truth, invidious comparison ends, and reticence shall ever guard the space that intervenes betwixt the grounds sacred to the exposition of the embodiment of ...
— Original Letters and Biographic Epitomes • J. Atwood.Slater
... sullying its fair antecedents. A class of persons attached themselves to the Huguenot community that could not be brought into subjection to the discipline instituted with such difficulty at Geneva. It would seem invidious to lay their excesses to the account of the Huguenot leaders, whether religious or political, since those excesses met with the ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... Though small in point of numbers,[17] it would have been hard to have picked a better one in point of quality. A finer body of horsemen, or one more adapted to the work in hand, than Strathcona's Horse it would be impossible to conceive. Without making any invidious comparisons, it is only just to say that these Canadian troops appeared to us to have no superiors, while the truly magnificent way in which they literally brushed away the opposition, on the morning we joined hands with General Barton, was ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... it. There is no European race which can afford to remember its first contact with the subject peoples otherwise than with shame, and attempts to assess their relative degrees of guilt are as fruitless as they are invidious. The question of real importance is how far these various states were able to purge themselves of the poison, and rise to a higher realization of their duty towards their races whom they were called by the claims of their own superior civilization to protect. The fate of that ...
— Progress and History • Various
... perpetuates what was originally a semi-charitable and second-rate method of treatment of the poorer classes. A State medical officer, devoting his whole time and attention to his State patients, has no occasion to make invidious distinctions ...
— Essays in War-Time - Further Studies In The Task Of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... has to deal with some refraction of this kind of problem. When it comes, moralizing and generalizing about the weakness of human nature does no good whatever. To call the man a fool is as invidious as to waste indignation upon the cause of his misfortune. Likewise, any frontal approach to the problem, such as telling the man, "Here's what you should do," should be shunned, or used most sparingly. The more effective attitude can be expressed ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... attention of such a distinguished person—that in point of fact was her main reason for disposing of the matter of the carriage horses herself. How could she trouble Sir Charles with such a homely detail?—But Damaris' case, needless to remark, was very different. At her age it was invidious to be too exclusive. Miss Felicia Verity felt—so she, Theresa, was certain—that it was a pity Damaris did not make more friends in the village now she was out of the schoolroom. May and Doris Horniblow were sweet girls and highly educated. They, of course, were going. And Captain ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... thinks that the public temples suffice his citizens for the purposes of sacrifice. He then continues, 'Gold and silver in other cities, whether in the keeping of private persons or of temples, are invidious possessions; ivory taken from a body wherefrom the life has passed is not a welcome offering; iron and bronze are instruments of war. Whatsoever a man dedicates, let it be of wood and wood only, or if it be of stone, of stone only.' The general murmur of assent shows, O Maximus, and you, gentlemen, ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius
... rebellion, medals had been granted to all others who had been on military duty against Louis Riel's revolt, but they were only given to the Mounted Police who had been actually under fire in an engagement. We do not care to know who was responsible for this extraordinary piece of invidious distinction. The Mounted Police have practically always been on active service and always liable to be under fire at any moment. Those who know the history know that all the members of the Force rendered service of ...
— Policing the Plains - Being the Real-Life Record of the Famous North-West Mounted Police • R.G. MacBeth
... publication of it by an invitation he received in 1638, from the authorities in Sweden, to visit their country and undertake the reformation of their schools. He replied that he was unwilling to undertake a task at once so onerous and so invidious, but that he would gladly give the benefit of his advice to anyone of their own nation whom they might select for the duty. These communications led him to resume his labor on the Great Didactic, and to translate it into Latin, in which form ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... hour of danger (2 Tim. iv. 10); and the many of whom S. Paul spoke with tears, "whose God is their belly, whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things" (Phil. iii. 19). And, lastly, of those in whom the seed bears fruit an hundredfold, it seems almost invidious to select examples. But such were the martyr Stephen, who prayed for his murderers (Acts vii. 60); Tabitha, "full of good works and almsdeeds" (Acts ix. 36); Cornelius, upon whom the Holy Ghost fell even before he was baptized (Acts x. 46); S. Luke, "the beloved physician" (Col. iv. 14), "whose ...
— The Kingdom of Heaven; What is it? • Edward Burbidge
... Holy See, had failed to do, but for a strange mishap which changed the whole face of affairs. James, in a fit of fondness, determined to make his mistress Countess of Dorchester in her own right. Catharine saw all the peril of such a step, and declined the invidious honour. Her lover was obstinate, and himself forced the patent into her hands. She at last accepted it on one condition, which shows her confidence in her own power and in his weakness. She made him give her a solemn promise, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the very best friends of the Effinghams will not maintain that they are pious. I do not wish to be invidious, or to say unneighbourly things; but were I upon oath, I could testify to a great many things, which would unqualifiedly show, that none of ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... quite as much as he; and it was deemed invidious to measure so accomplished a man, and so sworn a friend of peace and good order, by the minuter rules. But Napoleon should have died ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller
... corresponded. The successive erections on a row of vacant lots, usually illustrate this popular ambition. Some one secures the corner and builds his house. So far, so good. Presently number two comes along, and, to secure himself from invidious comparison, piles his house half a story higher than number one. But his triumph is short, for the third aspirant soon arrives, who, true to principle, takes another step in the ascending series. So it goes till the block ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various
... of his fellow sufferers. But, in after days, when the frenzy of that hideous epoch had subsided, it was remembered how loudly Colonel Pyncheon had joined in the general cry, to purge the land from witchcraft; nor did it fail to be whispered, that there was an invidious acrimony in the zeal with which he had sought the condemnation of Matthew Maule. It was well known that the victim had recognized the bitterness of personal enmity in his persecutor's conduct towards him, and that he declared himself hunted to death for his spoil. At the moment of execution—with ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... precisely, dinner was served, whether all the invited guests were arrived or not. Sir Joshua was never so fashionably ill-bred as to wait an hour perhaps for two or three persons of rank or title, and put the rest of the company out of humor by this invidious distinction. His invitations, however, did not regulate the number of his guests. Many dropped in uninvited. A table prepared for seven or eight was of ten compelled to contain fifteen or sixteen. There was a consequent deficiency of knives, forks, plates, and glasses. ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving
... went on persistently, there was no smoke to betray the enemy's position. The Imperial Horse lay quiet, and the enemy thinking they were perhaps annihilated ceased firing. Presently, however, when the troopers ventured out, the firing was renewed, and many were killed and wounded. It is invidious to mention special regiments when all fought so resolutely. The behaviour of the irregular forces, however, was the subject of general remark. They held their position under a heavy cross-fire, refusing to retire without their wounded. And when they did retire, the movement was executed without flurry, ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... such disagreement and forgetfulness as are here alluded to. "If a shooter is a good shot," says the same classic, "he may use No. 6 early in the season, and only for partridges—afterwards, nothing but No. 5. To the average shot, No. 6 throughout the season." This sounds dreadfully invidious. If a good shot cannot kill grouse with No. 6, how on earth is a merely average shot to do the trick? But, in these matters, the conversationalist finds his opportunity. Only they must not be pushed too ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, October 15, 1892 • Various
... is unpopular in this country to talk much about gentlemen and gentlewomen. People are touchy about social distinctions, which no doubt are often invidious and quite arbitrary and accidental, but which it is impossible to avoid recognizing as facts of natural history. Society stratifies itself everywhere, and the stratum which is generally recognized as the uppermost will be apt to have the advantage ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... was an Old Man of Aoster, Who possessed a large cow, but he lost her; But they said, "Don't you see she has rushed up a tree? You invidious ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... Peerage found a host of admirers. There were some malcontents, of course: ladies whose claims to be ranked among court beauties had been summarily passed over by the painter; for he has rather an invidious task before him who undertakes to decide who are the fifteen most beautiful of English women of quality. He is certain to make hundreds of enemies if he makes fifteen friends; and he cannot rely for certain upon doing even that much, for, as happened in the present instance, jealousies ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... receive me With such tip-tilted scorn? Self-love can scarce retrieve me From obloquy forlorn; 'Twas not my fault, believe me, That wealthy I was born. Of Nature's gifts invidious I'd choose I know not which; One might as well be hideous As shunn'd because he's rich. O Love, if thou art bitter, Then death must pleasant be; I know not which is fitter, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, March 4, 1893 • Various
... that Punch this week reiterates The Times's slurs at the meagerness and poverty of the American contribution. This is meanly invidious and undeserved. The inventors, artisans and other producers of our Country who did not see fit to incur the heavy expense of sending their most valuable products to a fair held three to five thousand miles away are unaffected by this studied disparagement, and those who ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... more would transform her whole social position. On its being asked of her then if she circulated only in a sort of tropical solitude, with the upper servants for picturesque natives, and on her having to assent to this glance at her limitations, she had found a reply to the girl's invidious question. "You've no imagination, my dear!"—that was because a door more than half open to the higher life couldn't be called anything but a thin partition. Mrs. Jordan's imagination quite did ...
— In the Cage • Henry James
... opportunity When to do it with impunity: You are neither—then he'll flatter Till he finds some trait for satire; Hunts your weak point out, then shows it Where it injures to disclose it, In the mode that's most invidious, Adding every trait that's hideous, From the bile, whose blackening river Rushes through his Stygian liver. Then he thinks himself a lover: Why I really can't discover In his mind, age, face, or figure: ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... of our common language which, though neither her first nor her last, seemed likely to be most permanently valued. The learning and literature of America at that time centred round Boston and Harvard University in the adjacent city of Cambridge, and no invidious comparison is intended or will be felt if they, with their poets and historians and men of letters at that time, with their peculiar atmosphere, instinct then and now with a life athletic, learned, business-like ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... from the fall of Nero to the accession of Nerva. The administration of Nerva introduced an age of justice and propriety, which Tacitus had destined for the occupation of his old age; but when he took a nearer view of his subject, judging, perhaps, that it was a more honorable or a less invidious office to record the vices of past tyrants, than to celebrate the virtues of a reigning monarch, he chose rather to relate, under the form of annals, the actions of the four immediate successors of Augustus. ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... watching the procession of the easy-going hours, I took a good many mental excursions. The one, perhaps, on which I oftenest started was a comparison between French manners, French habits, French types, and those of my native land. These comparisons are not invidious; I don't conclude against one party and in favor of the other; as the French say, je constate simply. The French people about me were "spending the summer" just as I had so often seen my fellow countrymen spend it, and it seemed to me, as it had seemed to me at home, that this operation ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... plates and send them round, instead of asking each individual if they choose soup, fish, &c. or what particular part they prefer; for, as they cannot all be choosers, you will thus escape making any invidious distinctions. ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner |
