"Meanly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... pride in his own virtue—preyed upon by cunning vice. He read Hamlet again. Oh, what depth of anguish! What a portrayal of grief and madness! Horace shook with the sobs that nearly choked him. Like the sleek murderer and his plump queen, the two creatures hatefulest to him lived their meanly prosperous lives on his bounty. What conscience flamed so dimly in the Danish prince that he could hesitate before his opportunity? Long ago, had Horace been in his place, the guilty pair would have paid in blood for their lust and ambition. ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... severe you are! How exceedingly uncharitable! How can you think so meanly of the people with whom you ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... moulded by a particular turn of the imagination. But, says Hume, as some men have not the turn of imagination, and others have, this alone is quite enough to make the widest difference of human characters, and to stamp one man as virtuous and humane, and another vicious and meanly interested. The analysis in no way sets aside the reality of moral distinctions. The question is, ...
— Moral Science; A Compendium of Ethics • Alexander Bain
... on duty until the morning she left, and although she rose early he had gone. She was disappointed, for she had not given him the handsome case of pipes she had bought, and she wanted to thank him. She felt she had acted rather meanly towards him. She owed her ...
— The Angel of Terror • Edgar Wallace
... among them that I knew, the doubt occurred to me whether it might not have been to my advantage if I had adopted a disguise before setting out for Hampshire. But there was something so repellent to me in the idea—something so meanly like the common herd of spies and informers in the mere act of adopting a disguise—that I dismissed the question from consideration almost as soon as it had risen in my mind. Even as a mere matter ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... company with the Leather-Stocking, as if they were of the same family; but there is a manifest difference in their manners. The youth delivers himself in chosen language, such as is seldom heard in these hills, and such as occasions great surprise to me, how one so meanly clad, and following so lowly a pursuit, could attain. Mohegan also knew him. Doubtless he is a tenant of Nattys hut. Did you remark the language of the ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... alienated every class of his subjects, and the barons who had obtained Magna Charta from King John had called in Louis of France. But through the conciliatory measures of the Regent Pembroke towards the barons, and the strong support which the Roman Church gave the boy-king (whose father had meanly done homage to the Pope), the foreigners were expelled, and the opposition of the barons was suppressed for a time, though in later years they again struggled with the crown for supremacy of power. When Henry had grown to manhood and the responsibility of government rested upon his own shoulders, ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... his attention attracted to the three friends. At first he looked uncomprehendingly, and then, as the features of the lads toward whom he had acted so meanly became plainer, he stared ...
— Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line - The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam • Clarence Young
... mother, his own poverty, and the defeat of Cope. He remained an hour and a half in the house, and shed tears. At last he came to the scaffold, certainly much terrified, but with a resolution that prevented his behaving in the least meanly or unlike a gentleman.(1278) He took no notice of the crowd, only to desire that the baize might be lifted up from the rails, that the mob might see the spectacle. He stood and prayed some time with Forster, who wept over him, exhorted and encouraged him. He delivered a long speech ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... lightest word was law, but who feared to give the word. Where muscles had been were unfilled folds of skin that shook; where a firm if selfish mouth had once smiled merrily beneath a pointed black mustache, a mouth still smiled, but meanly; the selfishness was there, ...
— Rung Ho! • Talbot Mundy
... people, and which can support ten millions, and needs at least three millions to develop fairly its abundant natural wealth; and no matter what he is, or what the effect of his presence might be, it is shameful that he should be meanly maltreated and persecuted among a people who boast themselves Christian ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff
... admiration for the young and handsome members of the other. The neighbours said that she was too high and mighty for her rank in life. Her grandfather said she was a "beauty", and like her poor dear mother. She herself thought rather meanly of her personal attractions, and rather highly of her mental ones. She was brimful of vitality, with strong passions, and little religious sentiment. She had not much respect for moral courage, for she did not understand it; but she was a ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... that you fellows use me as meanly as you know how," flared Hen. "You ought to be ...
— The Grammar School Boys Snowbound - or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports • H. Irving Hancock
... my hands and I will fight thee and thy men with no weapon but only my naked fists. I crave no weapon, but let me not be meanly hanged ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... Madden to Philip, Earl of Chesterfield, as appears from the following MS. note on a fly-leaf: "To his Excellency the Right Hon. Philip Earl of Chesterfield, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, these Tracts, writ (how meanly soever) with a real zeal for the service of that country, are most humbly presented by the author, his most ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 227, March 4, 1854 • Various
... the King's Highway, taking toll in bitterness and humiliation from every traveller along that road. For surely comfort is every man's heritage, surely the happy years should come to every man—not doled out, not meanly dependent on his moral orthodoxy, but as his right. The fat philanthropist is a debtor, but he behaves like a creditor; he distributes obligations with his gold, yet he has no right to the gold he gives. He makes his brother beg upon his knees for the life and the health ...
— Living Alone • Stella Benson
... "Master! what doth aggrieve them thus, That they lament so loud?" He straight replied: "That will I tell thee briefly. These of death No hope may entertain: and their blind life So meanly passes, that all other lots They envy. Fame of them the world hath none, Nor suffers; mercy and justice scorn them both. Speak not of them, but look, ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... Somali never stole, lied, seduced, cheated, drank, swore, gambled, betrayed, slandered, blasphemed, nor behaved meanly nor cowardly—but, alas! he ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren
... legal steps against you for the recovery of what was his by law in England OR ANY CIVILISED COUNTRY, one may presume. He would not STOOP to such measures even against those who, as you know well, so meanly and fraudulently deprived him and his of their inheritance. He is dead now. He died lacking the comforts and luxuries with which you might and SHOULD have provided him. His forbearance was wonderful and characteristic, but had I known of ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Appleslocombe. There might be even yet a hope for him; but his chance, he thought, would be better with the present Marquis—ill-disposed towards him as the Marquis was—than with the heir. The Marquis was weary of him, and anxious to get rid of him,—was acting very meanly to him, as Mr. Greenwood thought, having offered him L1000 as a final payment for a whole life's attention. The Marquis, who had ever been a liberal man, had now, perhaps on his death-bed, become unjust, harsh, and cruel. But ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... bartered either, or both, for a ship at one period. But!" he added, with a sneering laugh, "you may lay your life that when they boarded that Chinese fishing-boat on which they made their escape they'd pay for their passage as meanly as possible. No—my belief is that they still had those rubies on them when they turned up in England again, and that, as likely as not, they were murdered for them. Take all the circumstances of the murder into consideration—in each case the dead man's clothing ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... to regal pomp bows down, Prostrate to power, and cringing to a crown; The bolder villain spurns a decent awe, Tramples on rule, and breaks through every law; But he whose soul on honest truth relies, Nor meanly flatters power, nor madly flies. Thus timid authors bear an abject mind, And plead for mercy they but seldom find. Some, as the desperate, to the halter run, Boldly deride the fate they cannot shun; But such there are, whose minds, not taught to stoop, Yet hope for fame, and dare avow ...
— Inebriety and the Candidate • George Crabbe
... vigorously, and Sam said: "Waal, you can't think more meanly of me over that business than I do of myself. I have never been able to make out why I did it, and you may bet it ain't often I tells the story. It war a dog-goned piece of foolishness, and, as Harry ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... naked truth and honesty. Disdain me not for being a steward's son, one of thy father's servants." Felice interrupted him saying, "Cease, bold youth, leave off this passionate address; you are but young and meanly born, and unfit for my degree: I would not my father should know this." With this answer ...
— Traditional Nursery Songs of England - With Pictures by Eminent Modern Artists • Various
... his Heels and threw him into the Water, which was rather deep. The Abbe, much enraged, the moment he got himself out run at the Prince with great violence, a Horse-whip in his Hand, saying he thought very meanly of a Prince who cou'd not keep his word. The Prince flew from him, and getting to the Inn locked himself in one ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... know what they'll do," moaned Codfish. He had not forgotten how the Rover boys had sided with him on more than one perilous occasion, and it scared him half to death to think what they might do when they discovered how meanly he was acting. ...
— The Rover Boys at Big Horn Ranch - The Cowboys' Double Round-Up • Edward Stratemeyer
... sewing-machine in one hand; it was a heavy load, and the muddy road made things no easier. But for all that I walked with a light heart. It was a miserable business altogether, and I might as well admit I had acted a trifle meanly. Meanly? Not a bit! I formed myself into a little committee, and pointed out that those infernal girls had planned to entertain their sweethearts with my wine. Well and good; but was not my ill-will towards that idea male selfishness on my part? If two strange ...
— Wanderers • Knut Hamsun
... John's wise men thought little of the plan, King John himself thought that there was something in it. But instead of helping Columbus he meanly resolved to send out an expedition of his own. This he did, and when Columbus heard of it he was so angry that he left Portugal, which for more than ten years he had made his home. He was poor and in debt, so he left the country secretly, in fear of the ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall
... their acquaintance Bolkonski felt a passionate admiration for him similar to that which he had once felt for Bonaparte. The fact that Speranski was the son of a village priest, and that stupid people might meanly despise him on account of his humble origin (as in fact many did), caused Prince Andrew to cherish his sentiment for him the more, and unconsciously to ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... to mention that General Hamilton was my grandfather. Instead I told them that I was the son of an officer who had died for the cause of secession. This was the first time I had ever missed an opportunity of boasting of my relationship to my distinguished grandparent, and I felt meanly conscious that I was in a way disloyal. But they were so genuinely pleased when they learned that my father had fought for the South, that I lacked the courage to tell them that while he was so engaged another relative of mine had driven one ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... and very thin man, meanly dressed in a short, scanty jacket and well-darned hose. Unable, for some reason, to bend his neck, he carried his ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman
... Hamlin had no moral scruples, but he had the ethics of a sportsman, which he knew Mr. Van Loo was not. Whether the woman was an innocent schoolgirl or an actress, he was satisfied that Van Loo was doing a mean thing meanly. Mr. Hamlin also had a taste for mischief, and whether the woman was or was not fair game, he knew that for HIS purposes Van Loo was. With the greatest cheerfulness in the world he wheeled his horse and cantered ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte
... Rachel answered. "I'm against all this ... this progress. We're simply eating up people's lives, and paying meanly for them. I'd destroy all these factories ... the whole lot. They aren't worth the price. And I'd go back to decent piggery. What is the good of a plate when it means that some girl has been poisoned so that it ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... be persuaded, as he ought of this principle, that we are all originally descended from God, and that He is the Father of gods and men, I conceive he never would think meanly or degenerately concerning himself. Suppose Caesar were to adopt you, there would be no bearing your haughty looks. Will you not be elated on knowing yourself to be the son of Jupiter, of God Himself? Yet, in fact, we are not elated; but having two things in our ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various
... fixed and certain revenue in America, both for frontier defence against Indians and French and for the payment of colonial governors. While each stood ready to defend its own territory, the colonies were no doubt meanly slow about contributing to any common fund. They were frequently at loggerheads, too, with their governors over the question of salaries. On the other hand, the colonists made the strong plea that self-taxation was their only safeguard against tyranny of king, Parliament, ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... "I shall take order that you like it better, when you have been some time a dweller therein." Some attendants of a mean appearance, and with most suspicious visages, awaited them on their entrance, and they ascended a narrow staircase, which led to a room meanly furnished. "Wait here," said the kinsman, to the man who accompanied them, "till I go for company to divertise my cousin in his loneliness." They were left alone. Stanton took no notice of his companion, but ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... peril. But of what stamp must have been that soul which could find consolation in all this? And, as often happens, the man to whom she thus devoted herself was not wholly worthy of her. He had infinite spirit; but he was coldly calculating, profoundly selfish, meanly ambitious. He measured others by himself. He was naturally as subtle in evil, as she was disposed spontaneously to virtue. Full of finesse in his self-love and in the pursuit of his own interest, ...
— Political Women (Vol. 1 of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... in comparison merely, but in competition, with the claims of this. It looks upon both as parts of one system. It holds that a man may make the best of this world and of another at the same time. It does not teach its initiates to think better of other works and dispensations of God, by thinking meanly of these. It does not look upon life as so much time lost; nor regard its employments as trifles unworthy of immortal beings; nor tell its followers to fold their arms, as if in disdain of their state and species; but it looks soberly ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... meanly of me,' went on Cyril in the same heavy, monotonous voice, as though he were repeating some lesson that he had carefully conned and got by heart, 'as to suppose that I should take advantage of her promise and yours? If you will let me see her, I ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... went to the army; the poor Coetlogon was in tears until his return. In the winter, for being second in a duel, he was sent to the Bastille. Then the grief of Coetlogon knew no bounds: she threw aside all ornaments, and clad herself as meanly as possible; she begged the King to grant Cavoye his liberty, and, upon the King's refusing, quarrelled with him violently, and when in return he laughed at her, became so furious, that she would have used her nails, had he not been too wise to expose himself to them. Then she refused to attend to ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... let that intention go? Or are you doing any thing towards it? Make to yourself other ten talents. My letter is full of nothingness. I talk of nothing. But I must talk. I love to write to you. I take a pride in it. It makes me think less meanly of myself. It makes me think myself not totally disconnected from the better part of Mankind. I know, I am too dissatisfied with the beings around me,—but I cannot help occasionally exclaiming "Woe is me, that I am constrained to dwell with Meshech, and to have my ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... form of beating people when on his travels, cannot have made Smollett a popular character. He knew his faults, as he shows in the dedication of "Ferdinand, Count Fathom," to himself. "I have known you trifling, superficial, and obstinate in dispute; meanly jealous and awkwardly reserved; rash and haughty in your resentment; and coarse and ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang
... consciousness that though she was willing to connect all her own fortunes with his, she had much reason to expect that she might encounter ruin in doing so. Her sin had been in this,—that she had been anxious to subject Alice to the same danger,—that she had intrigued, sometimes very meanly, to bring about the object which she had at heart,—that she had used all her craft to separate Alice from Mr Grey. Perhaps it may be alleged in her excuse that she had thought,—had hoped rather than thought,—that the marriage which she contemplated would change much ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... I have been reputed royal and of royal lineage as far back as the memory of man can go; my father was a king and a king I myself was thought to be; and now I see myself riding here, meanly and miserably attended, while you come before me in splendour and magnificence, followed by the retinue that once was mine and all your other forces. [9] That would be bitter enough, methinks, from ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... the world, shut up within the circuit of a little island of the Mediterranean, and dwindled to the condition of an humble and degraded pensioner on the bounty of those he has most injured. How miserably, how meanly, has he closed his inflated career! What a sample of the bathos will his history present! He should have perished on the swords of his enemies, under the ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... noble sight," said Julian, "to behold the slumbering energies of a great mind awakened into energy, and to see it assume the authority which is its due over spirits more meanly endowed." ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... whole length of the Hall. {56} In the centre of the Hall stood Kai. "Tell me, tall man," said Peredur, "is that Arthur, yonder?" "What wouldest thou with Arthur?" asked Kai. "My mother told me to go to Arthur, and receive the honour of knighthood." "By my faith," said he, "thou art all too meanly equipped with horse and with arms." Thereupon he was perceived by all the household, and they threw sticks at him. Then, behold, a dwarf came forward. He had already been a year at Arthur's Court, both he and a female dwarf. They had ...
— The Mabinogion Vol. 1 (of 3) • Owen M. Edwards
... raised his head. "Well! Aramis," continued Porthos, "I have dreamed, I have imagined that an event has taken place in France. I dreamt of M. Fouquet all the night, of lifeless fish, of broken eggs, of chambers badly furnished, meanly kept. Villainous dreams, my dear D'Herblay; very ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... seemingly devoid of pain, 235 Or care, that what so tenderly he pressed Was a dependant on [13] the obdurate heart Of one who came to disunite their lives For ever—sad alternative! preferred, By the unbending Parents of the Maid, 240 To secret 'spousals meanly disavowed. ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... ministred such an occasion of laughter. And when I had washed and wiped my selfe, and returned home againe, I never remembred any such thing, so greatly was I abashed at the nodding and pointing of every person. Then went I to supper with Milo, where God wot we fared but meanly. Wherefore feigning that my head did ake by reason of my sobbing and weeping all day, I desired license to depart to my Chamber, and so I went ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius
... Janice thought of this she felt exceedingly angry with Stella. She had intended, after Stella had acted so meanly toward Amy Carringford, to let the farmer's daughter strictly alone in the future. She would have as little to do with her as it was possible, considering that she had to go to school with ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long
... Socrates as most truly a means which the gods made use of for the care and preservation of youth, and began to think meanly of himself, and to admire him; to be pleased with his kindness, and to stand in awe of his virtue; and, unawares to himself, there became formed in his mind that reflex image and reciprocation of Love, or Anteros,@ that Plato talks of. It was a matter of general wonder, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... renown, wrought a wonderful doorway, which was fast falling apart when I saw it. This gave access to a large room, the former Cloth Hall, now used as a sort of theatre and quite disfigured at one end by a stage and scenic arch. The walls were stenciled meanly with a large letter A surmounted by a crown. The interior had nothing of interest ...
— Vanished towers and chimes of Flanders • George Wharton Edwards
... as we before said, very small, and meanly furnished; yet were there a few articles of costliness and luxury scattered about, which told that the tastes of its owner had not been quite humbled to the level of his fortunes. One side of the narrow chamber was covered with shelves, which supported ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... esteemed highly and regarded much by those who knew him, in spite of those little foibles which marred his character; and I must beg the reader to take the world's opinion about him, and not to estimate him too meanly thus early in ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... room," because her sister, who has married a city man, is obliged to have a folding-bed in the cramped limits of her flat Partly because so little is done for him educationally, and partly because he must live narrowly and dress meanly, the life of the average laborer tends to become flat and monotonous, with nothing in his work to feed his mind or hold his interest. Theoretically, we would all admit that the man at the bottom, who performs the meanest and humblest work, so long as the work is necessary, performs a useful function; ...
— Democracy and Social Ethics • Jane Addams
... success, finds at last all he has got by his labor is a stinking nauseous animal. But my condition was yet worse than his; for he leaves the loathsome wretch to be torn by his hounds, whilst I was obliged to fondle mine, and meanly pretend him to be the object of my love. For the whole time I was in this envied, this exalted state, I led a continual life of hypocrisy, which I now know nothing on earth can compensate. I had no companion but the man I hated. ...
— From This World to the Next • Henry Fielding
... time and one pretence, and some at another, just as they pressed, without any sort of regard to their relations or dependencies. They never had any kind of system, right or wrong; but only invented occasionally some miserable tale for the day, in order meanly to sneak out of difficulties into which they had proudly strutted. And they were put to all these shifts and devices, full of meanness and full of mischief, in order to pilfer piecemeal a repeal of an act which they had not the generous ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... and, like Boileau, meanly thievish. The most admired verse of Racine is stolen, [107] so is almost every other that is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... of glory, Jesus Christ, Doth with respect of persons not consist; For if, my brethren, when there shall come in To your assembly one with a gold ring, In goodly clothes, and there shall also be Another man that's meanly cloth'd, and ye Shall have respect to him in rich attire, And say unto him, come thou, sit up higher; And bid the poor man stand or sit below, Are ye not partial then, and plainly show, That you do judge amiss in what you do? ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... beautiful life, my own. Music and Art and Nature shall surround us with an eternal harmony. We will have work, true work, such as suits our native power; these talents smothered in your brain and mine shall come to life in vigorous growth. Here in the world, struggling meanly for food, this cannot be. That shall be the true Utopia, Grey. Some day all mankind shall so live. We, now. "Will you come?"—drawing her softly towards him. "You do not yield?"—looking in her face. "I am sincere. I see ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... realize my meaning when I said that this man may be taken as being quite on the same intellectual plane as myself. You do not imagine that if I were the pursuer I should allow myself to be baffled by so slight an obstacle. Why, then, should you think so meanly of him?" ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... works of the devils that were leagued against them. Not a great while after this the Prophet fell ill of a fever, and at last died, to the great grief of those disciples who had known and loved him. Although he had always given his wealth to the poor so that he lived as meanly as the humblest of his followers—for this was one of the first things that he preached,—he was worshipped as being divine and had more than the homage of a mighty king. In the hands of his fanatical followers the scimitar became the symbol of the Mohammedan faith and hundreds of thousands ...
— A Treasury of Heroes and Heroines - A Record of High Endeavour and Strange Adventure from 500 B.C. to 1920 A.D. • Clayton Edwards
... and meanly to you. Then I was stubborn, but now ye shall drive your bargain with me all the more quickly because I was more stubborn then, and now I will go myself with you to the court with all my Thingmen, and stand by you in all such things as I can, and fight for you though ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... Grattan, and others of the same class, attacked it with unmeasured violence. The bill did not abolish tithe, and therefore it was not a bill to suit their notions. Of all the delusions which had ever been practised, they said, this was the most gross. Did ministers, they asked, think so meanly of the people of Ireland as to imagine that a change of name would be mistaken for a change of the thing, or that tithes would become less odious by being called a land-tax or an annuity? The people of Ireland objected ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... and rescue my daughter, my Ambulinia, as a brand from the eternal burning." "Forgive me, father, oh! forgive thy child," replied Ambulinia. "My heart is ready to break, when I see you in this grieved state of agitation. Oh! think not so meanly of me, as that I mourn for my own danger. Father, I am only woman. Mother, I am only the templement of thy youthful years, but will suffer courageously whatever punishment you think proper to inflict ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... think so, and I am quite ready to agree that a sailor's life is one of the best to choose, seeing that we shall have to spend the best part of ours afloat," he answered. "But what I hold is, that we shouldn't think meanly of those who have to live always ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... royal—his equal. He knew her, as she might be! Between them there was something deeper than the shallow kind greeting they gave the world,—recognition. She stood nearest to him,—she only! If sometimes she had grown meanly jealous of the thorough-bred, made women, down in the town yonder, his friends, in her secret soul she knew she was his peer,—she only! And he knew it. Not that she was not weak in mind or will beside him, but she ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... her opinion that Miss Vance was all the same too sweet for anything. She had not so vivid a consciousness of her father's money as Christine had; but she reposed perhaps all the more confidently upon its power. She was far from thinking meanly of any one who thought highly of her for it; that seemed so natural a result as to be amiable, even admirable; she was willing that any such person should get all the good there was in such an ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... owed especial respect and consideration to the daughter of his tenant, a man who had dealt faithfully by him, and whose father and grandfather had held Ashendale under the Latimers. He felt that he was acting meanly even while he kissed little Lucy by the red wall where the apricots were ripening in the sun. And he had no overmastering passion for excuse: what did he care for little Lucy? He was doing wrong, and he was doing it because it was wrong. He was in ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... the island of AEgina was depopulated by sickness, at the instance of AEacus, Jupiter turned the ants into men, that is, as some think, he made men of the inhabitants who lived meanly like ants. This is perhaps the fullest history ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... serves to depreciate or to ridicule his neighbour: nations proverb each other; counties flout counties; obscure towns sharpen their wits on towns as obscure as themselves—the same evil principle lurking in poor human nature, if it cannot always assume predominance, will meanly gratify itself by insult or contempt. They expose some prevalent folly, or allude to some disgrace which the natives have incurred. In France, the Burgundians have a proverb, Mieux vaut bon repas que bel habit; "Better a good dinner than a fine coat." These ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... the temerity to inquire the precise distance in which the train was pulled up, the shortest distance in which other trains have been pulled up, and the weight and velocity of the train in each case. He might also meanly suggest that putting on the brake left as little as possible to Providence. For our part, however, we will not pursue such hyper-criticism. It is applying to a miracle a test which it is not fitted to stand. Something must be left to faith, ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (First Series) • George W. Foote
... again, and thanked him for his civility. Being meanly clad, and very humble, he thought she asked alms; upon which he offered her two pieces of gold. The old woman stepped back in a sort of surprise, as if my brother had affronted her. "Good God!" said she, "what is the meaning of this? Is it ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 2 • Anon.
... humbler friends to their own level.[l] There are some who give their friends trouble by imagining that they are held in low esteem, which, however, is not apt to be the case except with those who think meanly of themselves. Those who feel thus ought to be raised to a just self-esteem, not only by kind words, but by substantial service. But what you do for any one must be measured, first by your own ability, and ...
— De Amicitia, Scipio's Dream • Marcus Tullius Ciceronis
... drifted away to still more general speculations, and always he was trying not to see the figure of Sir Isaac, grimly and yet meanly resolute—in possession. Always too like some open-mouthed yokel at a fair who knows nothing of the insult chalked upon his back, he disregarded how he himself coveted and desired and would if he could have ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... right [otherwise it is not steadiness, but obstinacy] and when it is exerted in material cases, is a quality, which, as my good Dr. Lewen was wont to say, brings great credit to the possessor of it; at the same time that it usually, when tried and known, raises such above the attempts of the meanly machinating. He used therefore to inculcate upon me this steadiness, upon laudable convictions. And why may I not think that I am now put upon ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... were anciently affected in cadaverous and corrupted burials; and the rigid Jews were wont to garnish the sepulchres of the righteous. Ulysses, in Hecuba, cared not how meanly he lived, so he might find a noble tomb after death.$ Great princes affected great monuments; and the fair and larger urns contained no vulgar ashes, which makes that disparity in those which time discovereth among us. The present urns were ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne
... complete the conditions. On this day the Mohammedan fast of Ramadhan ended, and the Arabs, who had worn their meanest garb, were now in their richest attire, and joy had everywhere succeeded penitent gloom. As for Musa, he seemed transformed. The meanly dressed and hoary ancient of the previous visit now appeared a man in the prime of life, his beard dark-red in hue, and his robes rich with gold and jewels. The Goths, to whom the art of dyeing the hair was unknown, looked on the ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... intention of demanding the payment of this debt," answered Amasis. "On the contrary, I am thankful that Phanes has escaped. Gyges has saved my soul from the guilt of shedding innocent blood, and thine from the reproach of having revenged thyself meanly on a man, to whom thy father ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... arbiter of his own fortune, ignoring that Providence who so often refuses the race to the swift and the battle to the strong. He was what in our time would be called eccentric. He walked barefooted, meanly clad, and withal not over cleanly, seeking public places, disputing with every body willing to talk with him, making every body ridiculous, especially if one assumed airs of wisdom or knowledge,—an exasperating opponent, since he wove a web around a man from which he could not be extricated, ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... specimens of in Chancery-lane, which are let out to various scales of pauperism with open door, and a common staircase. After him they silently slunk in, and followed by stealth up four flights, and saw him tap at a poor wicket, which was opened by an aged woman, meanly clad. Suspicion was now ripened into certainty. The informers had secured their victim. They had him in their toils. Accusation was formally preferred, and retribution most signal was looked for. Mr. Hathaway, the then steward ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... Gravity, that I shall not at present enter into it any further; but the Author of the following Letter [1] has treated it in the Essay he speaks of in such a Manner, that I am beholden to him for a Resolution, that I will never hereafter think meanly of any thing, till I have heard what they who have another Opinion of it have to say in ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... enter on this subject, we shall briefly consider the ideas entertained by the Romans on the subject of commerce. We have already had occasion incidentally to remark that the Romans thought meanly of it, and that their grand object in all their conquests was the extension of their territory; and that they even neglected the commercial facilities and advantages, which they might have secured by their conquests. This was most decidedly the case during the time of ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... suffrage was adopted. This would have been wise if intelligence and honesty had also been universal. But the result proved it to be an exceedingly bad policy, for it created a large class of voters who held the high privilege of citizenship so meanly, and were themselves so venal, that they would even sell their votes to the highest bidder. This, supplemented by the immorality of some of the intelligent citizens, made politics corrupt and the name of politician ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... she has it in her. You'll see, to-morrow," and with this Parthian shot Mrs Cowper quitted the room in tears, meanly leaving her mother to allay the tempest she had raised. On the morrow poor Lady Cinnamond was almost tempted to think as she did with regard to Honour, for Gerrard, putting his fortune to the touch without, as he assured himself, the slightest hope of success, met the same fate as ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier
... this indifferency, I mean, which they shall never make out, and which themselves, otherwhiles, unweave again. Always, so long as they think to get any place for higher notions about the ceremonies, they speak not so meanly of them as of things indifferent; but when all their forces of arguments and answers are spent in vain, then are our ears filled with uncouth outcries and declamations, which tend to make themselves appear blameless for receiving, and us blameworthy ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... he went down to a dingy frame building that cowered meanly in the shadow of the Criminal Court House. He mounted a creaking flight of stairs and went in at a low door on which "Loeb, Lynn, Levy and McCafferty" was painted in black letters. In the narrow entrance he brushed against a man on the way out, a man with a hangdog look and short bristling ...
— The Fortune Hunter • David Graham Phillips
... spoke with an emphasis, and looked down on Embro with a bright vivacity of eye, which forewarned the circle of one of his eloquent flashes: a smile of expectant enjoyment passed round,—"hallucination is the dust-heap and limbo of the meanly-equipped man of science to-day, just as witchcraft was a few hundred years ago. The poor creature of science long ago, when he came upon any pathological or psychological manifestation he did not understand, used to say, 'Witchcraft! Away with it to the limbo!' To-day he says, 'Hallucination! ...
— Master of His Fate • J. Mclaren Cobban
... one than the fact of his staying. It would be an adventure to break away, to depart, to go back, above all, to London, and tell Kate Croy he had done so; but there was something of the merely, the almost meanly, obliged and involved sort in his going on as he was. That was the effect in particular of Mrs. Stringham's visit, which had left him as with such a taste in his mouth of what he couldn't do. It had made this ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... monuments to the industry of its workmen. Rumor had it that the "streak" was rich, and that Doctor Slayforth, the owner, would be in on the first boat to personally oversee the clean-ups. The ex-missionary, Bill discovered, had the reputation of being a tight man, and meanly suspicious in money matters. He reposed no confidence in his superintendent, a surly, saturnine fellow known as Black Jack Berg, nor in Denny Slevin, his foreman. So much Laughing Bill gathered ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... loves the woodland and the farm To Virgil lends her gayest, tenderest charm. For me, this walk of satire, vainly tried By Atacinus and some few beside, Best suits my gait: yet readily I yield To him who first set footstep on that field, Nor meanly seek to rob him of the bay That shows so comely on ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... came. From her Marquez the tyrant learned that his speculation in treachery had collapsed. Louis Napoleon wanted no more of that stock. Besides, every French bayonet was needed in France. The rabid Leopard heard, and that night meanly crept away to save his own loathsome pelt. Bombs had begun to fall into the City, when a Mexican general worthier of the name took upon himself the heroic shame of unconditional surrender. The Oaxacans ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... can have a right to think meanly of his race, unless he also thinks meanly of himself. If, from a single fault or error, he judges of the character of another, and takes the single act as evidence of the whole nature of the man and of the whole course of his life, he ought to consent ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... come," she said quietly. "He prayed that you might return before he died. It seems that he felt he had treated you meanly and he wanted to tell ...
— The Boss of the Lazy Y • Charles Alden Seltzer
... more manly than to be meanly right, is an expression I once used on a former occasion, and it is equally applicable now. We feel something like respect for consistency even in error. We lament the virtue that is debauched into a vice, but the vice that ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... Cause I've meanly quitted For the sake of pelf; But ah, the Devil has me outwitted; Instead of ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... that I might leave you no room for hope; and since my story has been so unfortunate to alarm the whole world with a conduct so fatal, I made no scruple of telling you with what joy and pride I was undone; if this encourage you, if Octavio have sentiments so meanly poor of me, to think, because I yielded to Philander, his hopes should be advanced, I banish him for ever from my sight, and after that disdain the little service he can render ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... are deceived, I came to rail at you, and talk such Truths, too, as shall let you see the Vanity of that Pride, which taught you how to set such a Price on Sin. For such it is, whilst that which is Love's due is meanly ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... said, "Let your prayer be for light and knowledge, and ask the Blessed Infinite One to help you to love all; let love rule; never mind what others may say about you, or how meanly they may treat you. Be in earnest to love all. Rise every morning with this thought: 'How beautiful my brother is; how precious is my sister.' You may not love a person's ways, but you should always love the person. Separate the two in your mind and it will help you much. Start the day with ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge
... with shame into the square, When it is fully thronged with gazing wight, Whom they of cuirass and of helmet bare, And leave in simple cassock, meanly dight; And, as to slaughter he conducted were, Place on a wain, conspicuous to the sight; Harnessed to which two sluggish cows are seen, Weary and weak, and with ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... syl.), the chief character of The Rehearsal, a farce by George Villiers, duke of Buckingham (1671). Bayes is represented as greedy of applause, impatient of censure, meanly obsequious, regardless of plot, and only anxious for claptrap. The character is meant ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... it bears Here, in the court! be a man ne'er so vile, In wit, in judgment, manners, or what else; If he can purchase but a silken cover, He shall not only pass, but pass regarded: Whereas, let him be poor, and meanly clad, Though ne'er so richly parted, you shall have A fellow that knows nothing but his beef, Or how to rince his clammy guts in beer, Will take him by the shoulders, or the throat, And kick him down ...
— Every Man Out Of His Humour • Ben Jonson
... I will also add another, namely that not even Nero's Golden House would satisfy Vitellius. He delighted in and commended the name and the life and all the practices of its former owner, yet he found fault with the structure itself, saying that it had been badly built and was scantily and meanly equipped. When he fell ill one time he looked about for a room to afford him an abode; so little did even Nero's surroundings satisfy him. His wife Galeria ridiculed the small amount of decoration found ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio
... but irresolute man, was appalled by the storm he had helped raise. He meanly disclaimed all responsibility for Cresap's action,[34] and deposed him from his command of rangers; to which, however, he was soon restored by Lord Dunmore. Both the earl and his lieutenant, however, united in censuring severely Greathouse's deed.[35] Conolly, throughout May, held a series ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... without his approbation." This discovery was made while I was abroad visiting, and just as I was about to return home, I received a letter from my father, importing that, since I had acted so undutifully and meanly as to marry a beggar, without his privity or consent, to the disgrace of his family as well as the disappointment of his hopes, he renounced me to the miserable fate I had entailed upon myself, and charged me never to set foot within his doors again. This rigid ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... to moorings with half-a-dozen captured merchantmen. But a few weeks before, he had come home from a cruise with a little money in his pockets. He had clubbed together with some shipmates, and had purchased a small ship with the common fund. She was but meanly equipped, yet her first cruise to the westward, on the coast of Campeachy, was singularly lucky. Mansvelt at once saw his opportunity to win recruits. A captain so fortunate as Morgan would be sure to attract ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... when some mighty lord Or potentate's to be restor'd 240 And pardon'd for some great offence, With which be's willing to dispense, First has him laid upon his belly, Then beaten back and side to a jelly; That done, he rises, humbly bows, 245 And gives thanks for the princely blows; Departs not meanly proud, and boasting Of this magnificent rib-roasting. The beaten soldier proves most manful, That, like his sword, endures the anvil, 250 And justly's held more formidable, The more his valour's malleable: ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... impression which they hoped this pomp would have made on them. It appeared so ridiculous a show to all that had never stirred out of their country, and had not seen the customs of other nations, that though they paid some reverence to those that were the most meanly clad, as if they had been the ambassadors, yet when they saw the ambassadors themselves, so full of gold and chains, they looked upon them as slaves, and forbore to treat them with reverence. You might have seen ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... it. I was sick for a couple of days, meanly sick, and my arms were painfully poisoned from the barnacle scratches. For a week I could not use them, and it was a torture to put on and take off ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London
... less favourable to the Chevalier than usual, although he suffered no loss of any consequence. Then a little thin old man, meanly clad, and almost repulsive to look at, approached the table, drew a card with a trembling hand, and placed a gold piece upon it. Several of the players looked up at the old man at first greatly astonished, ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... supported the senators, being annoyed at the unusual measures of Caesar: for what the boldest and most reckless tribunes were used to propose for popularity's sake, these very measures Caesar in the possession of consular power adopted, basely and meanly endeavouring to ingratiate himself with the people. Caesar's party, therefore, being alarmed, had recourse to violence, and first of all a basket of ordure was thrown upon Bibulus as he was going down ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... dear Marlow! But I'll suppress the emotion. Were I a wretch, meanly seeking to carry off a fortune, you should be the last man in the world I would apply to for assistance. But Miss Neville's person is all I ask, and that is mine, both from her deceased father's consent, and her ...
— She Stoops to Conquer - or, The Mistakes of a Night. A Comedy. • Oliver Goldsmith
... her with her veil off, as she was then; and though she was somewhat advanced in years, she had the remains of a good face, which showed what she had been in her youth. The sultan, who had always seen her dressed very meanly, not to say poorly, was surprised to find her as richly and magnificently attired as the princess, his daughter. This made him think Aladdin equally prudent and wise ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... by passion, your nobler feelings are only obscured, not extirpated; think, then, how they will all rise in revenge of your insulted dignity, when your name becomes a stranger to your ears, and you are first saluted by one so meanly adopted!—" ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... understand the Italian, Spanish, and French tongues very perfectly: hoping, that as his predecessors, so he might in time attain the place of a Secretary of State, he being at that time very high in the King's favour, and not meanly valued and loved by the most eminent and most powerful of the Court Nobility. This, and the love of a Court-conversation, mixed with a laudable ambition to be something more than he then was, drew him often from Cambridge, to attend the King wheresoever the Court was, who then gave him ...
— Lives of John Donne, Henry Wotton, Rich'd Hooker, George Herbert, - &C, Volume Two • Izaak Walton
... aching heart The grateful sense shall cherish'd be; I'll think less meanly of myself, That Lloyd will ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... town of any importance on the road. It is pleasantly seated in a valley, is of no great size, is but meanly built, though extremely neat, has a cathedral and a bishop, and is the shire-town of Hampshire. The assizes were sitting, and Southampton was full of troops that had been sent from Winchester, in order to comply with a custom which forbids ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... left never a tooth. But it is no matter, what he wanted in person he had in the purse, which the poore gentlewoman little regarded, wishing rather to tie herself to one that might fit her content, though they lived meanly, then to him with all the wealth in Italye. But shee was yong, and forcst to follow her father's direction, who, upon large covenants, was content his daughter should marry with the doctor, and whether she likte him or no, the match was made up, and in short time she was married. The poore wench ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... creature, with shaven crown, bare legs, sandaled feet, and a grizzly beard,—led us by a long passage first into the refectory. It was a hall of no great dimensions, meanly furnished with deal benches and tables, and surrounded on the walls, with some rude representations of the most loathsome and horrid martyrdoms. The tables were spread with wooden trenchers, each of which had a morsel of rye-bread beside it, and beneath each bench were rows of spit-boxes,—one ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig
... memoir of Milton, which the author of this article drew up some years ago for a public society, and which is printed in an abridged shape, he took occasion to remark, that Dr. Johnson, who was meanly anxious to revive this slander against Milton, as well as some others, had supposed Milton himself to have this flagellation in his mind, and indirectly to confess it, in one of his Latin poems, where, speaking of Cambridge, and declaring that he has no longer any pleasure in the thoughts of revisiting ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... dost thou so meanly fare? But if thy mother knew thy pain, Her heart would surely break ...
— Household Stories by the Brothers Grimm • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... of the high honour done me on this occasion by your sovereign. I have always endeavoured to deserve his friendship, by dealing strictly with his subjects, and by constantly exerting myself to procure immediate ladings for their ships. Hitherto the Portuguese, who have visited my country, were meanly dressed, and easily satisfied with the commodities we had to give them; and so far from desiring to remain in the country, were always anxious to complete their cargoes, and to return whence they came. This day I ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... and stockily built; his face was not at all good looking. It is said he was generally meanly dressed and was homely, but full of nobility, fine feeling and highly cultivated. The eyes were black and bright, and they dilated, when the composer was lost in thought, in a way that made him look inspired. A mass of dark hair surmounted ...
— The World's Great Men of Music - Story-Lives of Master Musicians • Harriette Brower
... party politicians. Another of the ideas, as widely current, is that every ton of rice or wheat exported is an injury to the poor. A third is that the payments made in Britain by the Government of India are virtually tribute, meanly exacted, instead of honest payment for cash received and for services rendered. Again, what can be the remedy? In the early part of the nineteenth century, the Foreign Mission Committee of the Church of Scotland objected ...
— New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century - A Study of Social, Political, and Religious Developments • John Morrison
... abound, Clear flow the waters of the varying ground; Cold nipping winds a lengthen'd winter bring, Late rise the products of the tardy spring. The broken soil a labouring race requires; Each barren hill its generous crops admires, Where nature meanly did her gifts impart, Yet, smiling, owns how much she owes ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 6: Literary Curiosities - Gleanings Chiefly from Old Newspapers of Boston and Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... you there shall find To human view displayed, All meanly wrapped in swathing bands, And ...
— The Otterbein Hymnal - For Use in Public and Social Worship • Edmund S. Lorenz
... acquainted with the India Company, and by no means a friend to this bill, has told you that a ministerial influence has always been predominant in that body,—and that to make the Directors pliant to their purposes, ministers generally caused persons meanly qualified to be chosen Directors. According to his idea, to secure subserviency, they submitted the Company's affairs to the direction of incapacity. This was to ruin the Company in order to govern it. This was certainly influence in the very worst form in which it could appear. ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... don't want to pile up the agony. Besides," she added, with an obvious effort, "I must be honest. I—I know I have given you reason to think meanly of me—vilely! But, don't you see, Mark, I—I have done with all that. I was never so anxious to make the best of myself. Not that it ...
— Enter Bridget • Thomas Cobb
... has yielded up his breath Once more, though down he pluck'd the shield, to prove His prowess under Troy, and bade grim death O'er skin and nerves alone exert its power, Not he, you grant, in nature meanly read. Yes, all "await the inevitable hour;" The downward journey all one day must tread. Some bleed, to glut the war-god's savage eyes; Fate meets the sailor from the hungry brine; Youth jostles age in funeral obsequies; ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace
... life they happen clumsily, stupidly, meanly. One goes to the theatre just for the refreshment of seeing them happen in another way—in symmetrical, satisfactory form, with unmistakable effect and just at ...
— Picture and Text - 1893 • Henry James
... asserting himself beyond his intention. Had overcome, had worsted her; yet, as it occurred to him, won a but barren victory. That she was alienated and resentful he could hardly doubt, while the riddle he had rather meanly used to procure her discomfiture remained unanswered as ever, dipped indeed only deeper in mystery. He was hoist with his own petard, in short; and stood there nonplussed, vexed alike ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... seemed to be getting nowhere I meanly rolled the lady a cigarette. She hates to stop knitting to roll one, but she will stop ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... have scarcely strength to stir. The subtlety of their thoughts betrays a mind lacking in substance; they are incapable of any great or noble feeling, they have neither simplicity nor vigour; altogether abject and meanly wicked, they are merely frivolous, deceitful, and false; they have not even courage enough to be distinguished criminals. Such are the despicable men produced by early debauchery; if there were but one among them who knew how ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... as some Boswell or literary worshipper to this saint or to that? That is the only lese-majesty. Here art thou with whom so long the universe travailed in labor; darest thou think meanly of thyself whom the stalwart Fate brought forth to unite his ragged sides, to shoot the ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... greatness than of her honour and service, and then "digressing into old griefs," said the envoy, "too long and tedious to write." She vehemently denounced Davison also for dereliction of duty in not opposing the measure; but he manfully declared that he never deemed so meanly of her Majesty or of his Lordship as to suppose that she would send him, or that he would go to the Provinces, merely, "to take command of the relics of Mr. Norris's worn and decayed troops." Such a change, protested ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... genius. They have discovered him never controlling, never creating events, but always yielding to them with rapid change, and sheltering himself from inconsistency by perpetual indefiniteness. In the Russian war, they saw him abandoning meanly what he had planned weakly, and threatened insolently. In the debates on the Regency, they detected the laxity of his constitutional principles, and received proofs that his eloquence consisted not in the ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... of their sale, a mixed crowd was gathered, some of them bidders, some idlers drawn thither by curiosity. Others were in the house behind examining the wares before they came to the hammer. Presently an old woman, meanly clad with her face veiled to the eyes, and bearing on her back a heavy basket such as was used to carry fruit to market, presented herself at ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... said, "for if I were a princess and you were a shopkeeper I would marry you, and be proud of my husband. Don't think so meanly of me as that. There is ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... Fate used me meanly; but I looked at her and laughed, That none might know how bitter was the cup I quaffed. Along came Joy, and paused beside me where I sat, Saying, 'I came to see what you were ...
— Poems of Optimism • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... between Stainless and stained and high and mean; They to whose lot fair signs may fall Were but as they who lack them all, And those to virtuous thoughts inclined Were but as men of evil mind. If in the sacred name of right I do this wrong in duty's spite; The path of virtue meanly quit, And this polluting sin commit, What man who marks the bounds between Virtue and vice with insight keen, Would rank me high in after time Stained with this soul destroying crime? Whither could I, the sinner, turn, How hope a seat in heaven to earn, If I my ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... the denouement. For now we were in Paris, rather meanly lodged in a dingy hotel on a narrow street leading from what with us might have been Piccadilly Circus. Our rooms were rather a good height with a carved cornice and plaster enrichments, but the furnishings ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... state of perfect sanctification. E. E. and I gave him a beautiful example, and looked as humbly grateful as two hungry female women could, over a double spoonful of watery squash; I fear he did not appreciate it though, for when a deep Amen rolled down the hall, after the thanks were given, he meanly growled out—well, a very peculiar word, that made my heart jump into my mouth. In any other place, I should write out boldly that Cousin Dempster—but in that out-door sanctuary—no, the secret of what he said shall go with me to ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... Pope. And shall not Britain now reward his toils, Britain, that pays her patriots with her spoils? In vain at Court the bankrupt pleads his cause, His thankless country leaves him to her laws. The sense to value riches, with the art T' enjoy them, and the virtue to impart, Not meanly, nor ambitiously pursued, Not sunk by sloth, nor raised by servitude; To balance fortune by a just expense, Join with economy, magnificence; With splendour, charity; with plenty, health; O teach us, Bathurst! yet unspoiled by wealth! That secret rare, between the ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... freeholders of England do not rate the commerce, the credit, the religion, the liberty, the independency of their country, and the succession of their crown, at a shilling in the pound land-tax! They never gave him reason to think so meanly of them. And, if I am rightly informed, when that measure was debated in Parliament, a very different reason was assigned by the author's great friend, as well as by others, for that reduction: one very different from the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... dear madam, to tell,' said she, 'and much to explain, 'ere you will admit me again to that esteem of which I was once so justly proud. I had no resource from misery, but in flight; and of that I could not make you a confidant, without meanly involving you in its disgrace.'—'Say no more, my love, on the subject,' replied madame; 'with respect to myself, I admired your conduct, and felt severely for your situation. Rather let me hear by what means you effected your escape, and what has since be fallen you.'—Julia ...
— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe
... are looking,"—"I am glad to see you," &c. so common in his ears, would scarcely ever have been used had it not been for my influence. To be sure I have overheard him say, as we have been walking along, "There goes an old acquaintance of mine; but, bless me, how altered he is! he looks poor and meanly dressed, but I'm determined I'll speak to him, for fear he should think me so shabby as to shy him." Thus giving an instance in himself, certainly, of respect for the man and not the coat. My short ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 262, July 7, 1827 • Various
... "the crown," if this laudable opposition should not be successful, "will have the power of taxing America at pleasure." Surely they think rather too meanly of our apprehensions, when they suppose us not to know what they well know themselves, that they are taxed, like all other British subjects, by parliament; and that the crown has not, by the new imposts, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... the dress he had formerly refused and next day clothed himself in another new suit which he had received from us in the autumn. Ever since his arrival at the fort he had dressed meanly and pleaded poverty but, perceiving that nothing more could be gained by such conduct, he thought proper to show some of his riches to the strangers who were daily arriving. In the afternoon however he made another though a covert attack upon us. He informed ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... not indulged in a fight overnight. There can be no middle course. That he should be uncertain on the point was ridiculous. Yet, try as he would, he could not be sure. There were moments when he seemed on the very verge of settling the matter, and then some invisible person would meanly insert a red-hot corkscrew in the top of his head and begin to twist it, and this would interfere with calm thought. He was still in a state of uncertainty when Bayliss returned, bearing healing liquids ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... loyal to those he served, unless perchance a very heavy bribe were offered him and there was a reasonable probability of safety in accepting it. He had risen to some authority amongst his fellows, and did not think meanly of himself. He was convinced that his treatment of Barbara Lanison had been diplomatic, whereas his whole manner and conversation had put her upon her guard. He had succeeded in convincing her that he was laying a trap for her indiscretion, and that ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner
... 'and then you and George can take a turn at local-preaching when you're cut out. I'm off.' So without another word I jumped on to my horse and went off down the hill, across the creek, and over the boulders the other side, without much caring where I was going. The fact was, I felt I had acted meanly in sneering at a man who only said what he did for my good; and I wasn't at all sure that I hadn't made a breach between Gracey and myself, and, though I had such a temper when it was roused that all ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... other side, which was nearest to the wall, was occupied by a party, or rather family, consisting of a grimy- looking man, somewhat under the middle size, dressed in faded velveteens, and wearing a leather apron—a rather pretty-looking woman, but sun-burnt, and meanly dressed, and two ragged children, a boy and girl, about four or five years old. The man sat with his eyes fixed upon the table, supporting his chin with both his hands; the woman, who was next to ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... in the man's dark eyes, his face was black with passion, and the bright object she had seen flashing in his hand was the twin brother of Huntington's six-shooter. He was roughly, even meanly, dressed. His coarse blue flannel shirt was unbuttoned at the throat; his soiled brown corduroy trousers were thrust unevenly into dusty and wrinkled boot tops; his old, gray hat was slouched over one side of his forehead, shading his eyes. But the face beneath that ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... province will yield innumerable examples: and why then should baseness of birth be objected to any man? Who thinks worse of Tully for being arpinas, an upstart? Or Agathocles, that Silician king, for being a potter's son? Iphicrates and Marius were meanly born. What wise man thinks better of any person for his nobility? as he said in [3658]Machiavel, omnes eodem patre nati, Adam's sons, conceived all and born in sin, &c. "We are by nature all as one, all alike, if you see us naked; ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... now. He'll wait as long as may be. He would sin, but he would not sin meanly. In his conception of himself a greatness, even in transgression, must clothe all that he does. He'll wait, gravely and decently, even though to wait is his heavy risk." He made a gesture with his hand. "Do I not know him, know him well? Sometimes I think that for three years ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... Jove command, That, he accurst, shall reach th' Italian land, There may he meet in arms, a warlike race, There helpless rove, torn from his son's embrace, His friends untimely end there let him feel; 760 For succour there to strangers meanly kneel; And when for peace, ingloriously he sues, His crown, his life, untimely may he lose, And lie unburied on the naked shore; 765 With the last breath of life this pray'r I pour. And you, my Tyrian ...
— The Fourth Book of Virgil's Aeneid and the Ninth Book of Voltaire's Henriad • Virgil and Voltaire |
